"Amazing double #red #sprites captured by Panagiotis Tsouras in Aegean Sea #Greece earlier today:
Red sprites are large-scale electric discharges that occur in the mesosphere, high above thunderstorm clouds, or cumulonimbus, giving rise to a varied range of visual shapes flickering in the night sky. They are usually triggered by the discharges of positive lightning between an underlying thundercloud and the ground. Reports of optical phenomena above thunderstorms where first published in scientific literature in the late 19th century (Toynbee and Mackenzie, 1886, Everett and Everett, 1903). In the 1950s the first airborne observation was reported from a commercial airlines pilot over Fiji (Wright, 1950). CTR Wilson, regarded as the father of lightning theory, was the first to try to describe these phenomena physically (Wilson, 1956). Not until 1989 were these phenomena captured on film. A group from the University of Minnesota recorded a twin upward flash from distant cloud tops while testing a low light level TV camera intended for sounding rockets (Franz,et al 1989)
The name "sprite" was first proposed by Dr. Davis Sentman from the University of Alaska and first used in literature by W.A. Lyons in 1994."
