Red Sprites and Blue Jets

Red Sprites and Blue Jets are names for electromagnetic events that occur above thunderstorms. While they are one of the most abundant events on our planet, most people have never witnessed either. In fact, photographs of them are rare, and movies even more so.

So we have these incredible, huge events, taking place all the time, all over our world, that most have never witnessed, and even with advanced sensing equipment and cameras, including from the Space Shuttle and Space Station, we have very little evidence.

These are not small discharges of energy, they can be 75 miles high, and a hundred square miles wide.

I find that amazing.

So here is some of the evidence.

A movie
http://elf.gi.alaska.edu/movies/wf3541.mpg
and the website
http://elf.gi.alaska.edu/#why


NASA
http://wwwghcc.msfc.nasa.gov/skeets.html

Howstuffworks has a video on lightning, that contains some excellent research footage of sprites.
This page has the video link.

Extensive research and documentation here (pdf) 
http://www-star.stanford.edu/~vlf/publications/theses/cpblThesis.pdf


(updated Nov 13 2014)

http://www.livescience.com/common/media/video/player.php?videoRef=080607sprites
http://www.livescience.com/42731-weird-lightning-types.html
http://www.livescience.com/39045-red-sprites-lightning-photo-gallery.html
http://www.livescience.com/39033-red-sprites-lightning-photos.html
http://www.livescience.com/6571-elves-sprites-caught-dancing-edge-space.html
http://www.livescience.com/45493-origin-of-reddish-lightning-sprites-revealed.html

Awesome video

also new blog post, thanks and a tip of the hat to Wattsupwiththat