Disney films open with a medieval castle and a lavish fireworks display above it. The opening sequence that is symbolic of Disney has appeared in real life. On the 9th (local time), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) released an image of a massive fireworks-like display in the sky over Château de Beynac in France.
This massive fireworks display over a medieval castle was staged by nature, not humans. It was a sprite, in which red lightning pours down from the sky. NASA released the photo capturing that moment as the December image of its science calendar. It is a perfect fit for December, which includes Christmas.
◇Red lightning pouring over a medieval castle
After lightning flashes in the sky, something else appears. High above a thunderstorm, a crimson form flickers in and out. If you saw this in the sky, consider yourself lucky to have witnessed a sprite, a very rare electrical phenomenon in the upper atmosphere.
A sprite is lightning that occurs in the mesosphere. The mesosphere is one layer of Earth's atmosphere, located between the stratosphere and the thermosphere at an altitude of 50–80 km. Ordinary lightning occurs in thunderstorms a few kilometers above the ground, but sprites occur much higher, at 80 km. Right after lightning strikes, red flashes appear in various shapes, followed by columns and branches that pour down from the sky.
Lightning is a phenomenon in which electric current moves through the atmosphere. Air is an insulator that does not conduct electricity. But when electric charge accumulates in a cloud, it can travel through air even without a path. Charge is the amount of electricity an object has. If there are more electrons than protons with elementary charge, it becomes a negative (-) charge; if there are fewer electrons, it becomes a positive (+) charge.
When charge builds up in a cloud, the voltage rises—much like a dam filled with water increases pressure—and current flows in an extremely brief instant. Ordinary lightning moves from clouds in the troposphere, which extends up to an altitude of 11 km, to the ground. However, above the clouds there are other kinds of lightning. Sprites are representative. Sprites appear to dance above thunderstorms, turning on and off in sequence.
◇Mega lightning that occurs above the clouds
Sprites are one type of upper-atmospheric lightning called transient luminous events (TLE). The concept of TLEs was first proposed in 1989. Unlike ordinary lightning, these powerful discharges occur above thunderclouds and are also called "mega lightning."
TLEs have a variety of names befitting their fantastic appearance. Among mega lightning are sprites that fall down from the ionosphere at an altitude of 90 km to as low as 15 km, and, conversely, "blue jets" that rise from the tops of thunderclouds to the ionosphere 70 km above the ground.
Above that are "Elves," which appear horizontally in the thermosphere at an altitude of 100 km as a gigantic donut shape 400 km across. There are also hybrid types in which two kinds of mega lightning combine. The "gigantic jet" has a red sprite above and a blue blue jet below, rising to an altitude of 90 km.
Beynac, where the sprite was photographed, is considered the most beautiful village in the Dordogne region of southwestern France. A 12th-century castle stands on a cliff rising beside the Dordogne River, and climbing the steep stone alleys lined with stone dwellings makes you feel as if you have returned to the Middle Ages.
Right after a sprite occurs, a green halo sometimes appears at the top like a ghost. This is a "mesospheric ghost." The Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía in Spain said in 2023 that the flickering green ghost at the top of sprite lightning is produced by iron particles arriving from space. It is as if ghosts from the cosmos are dancing in the sky above a medieval village.
References
NASA (2025), https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/sprites-over-chateau-de-beynac/
Nature Communications (2023). DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-42892-1