Blue Jet Lightning is not your typical type of lightning. It is a rare occurrence. Photographer Matthew Griffiths recently captured six of them over Texas' Big Bend National Park. Let's Explore, what is so special about this phenomena.
What Is Blue Jet?
Blue jets are rarely visible from the ground. This occurs because they are short and are usually obscured by clouds.
It appears between a thundercloud's upper positive charge zone and a negative filtering layer above the charge region.
The jets' blue colour is caused by blue and near-ultraviolet emission lines from neutral and ionised molecular nitrogen.
What Creates Blue Jet Lightning?
When a positively charged upper component of a cloud combines with a negatively charged layer directly above it, blue jets form.
Then, for a brief moment, both opposing charges are equalised, resulting in a vivid blue discharge of static electricity. This is known as 'blue lighting’
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I started a five-night road trip through West Texas on July 28 in order to take pictures of the Milky Way," he says. However, I changed my mind and went with red sprites because there were approaching thunderstorms." spaceweather.com reports
The photographer ended up catching Blue jets. Blue jets, which were first captured from a space shuttle in 1989, may resemble lightning, but they aren't the same. Normal lightning carves a fiery path through the air, heating it to 30,000 degrees Celsius. Blue jets are made of cold plasma, which is similar to the gas inside a fluorescent light bulb.
Cover Image: Youtube/NASA
