ALBAWABA - This video shows an extremely rare phenomenon known as "upper atmospheric lightning" that an airline pilot witnesses and records.
Dr. Abdullah Al-Misnid, a renowned climate specialist and former professor at Qassim University in Saudi Arabia, commented on a widely shared video that showed an amazing astronomical phenomenon known as "Upper Atmospheric Lightning".
The video shows an Airbus being flown by a pilot while lightning strikes appear below the clouds. At the end of the video, a massive bolt that looks like a laser beam piercing the sky shoots skyward.
'Jellyfish Lightning' or 'Red Sprites' are the names given to these phenomena, which Al-Misnid described as an extremely rare visual display. These phenomena are cold upper air discharges that appear above massive thunderstorms.
Al-Misnid emphasised that these events appear in the ionosphere layer, at astonishing heights between 50 and 90 kilometres above Earth's surface—exactly where the aurora borealis is visible in the atmosphere.
He pointed out that this phenomenon was first recorded in 1989, underscoring its ongoing mystery to both atmospheric scientists and enthusiasts.
The lightning bolts could be seen shooting out from beneath the clouds. One particularly large bolt appeared out of nowhere, piercing the sky like a laser beam.
At times, lightning strikes up to 300 km above Earth.
