Introducing the Green Ghost | Spaceweather.com
The News discusses the discovery of the origin of mysterious green ‘ghosts’ in the sky, a rare electrical phenomenon observed during storms. Engineer MarĂa Passas Varo’s team, from the Spanish Research Council’s Andalusia Institute of Astrophysics, identified metals, particularly iron and nickel from interstellar dust, as the cause of these phenomena. The green ghosts are part of transient luminous phenomena, first detected in 1989, known as sprites, trolls, elves, and ghosts, each with distinct characteristics.
The article details the team’s instrument, a spectrograph, which separates light to identify chemical elements. Surprisingly, the analysis revealed an unexpected abundance of iron, challenging prior expectations. The study, published in Nature Communications, suggests that gravity waves lowered the iron layer, explaining the infrequency of green ghosts. In four years of observation, only one was located.
This Spanish research marks the first scientific publication on green ghosts. The broader context includes NASA’s Spritacular program, encouraging citizen participation in observing transient luminous events. Despite occasional misidentifications as UFOs, the team emphasizes these phenomena as natural, elucidating their shapes and atmospheric triggers. The study contributes to a global database aimed at unraveling mysteries surrounding atmospheric spectra.
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