Starship Asterisk*

Sakurajima Volcano with Lightning

Explanation: Why does a volcanic eruption sometimes create lightning? Pictured above, the Sakurajima volcano in southern Japan was caught erupting in early January. Magma bubbles so hot they glow shoot away as liquid rock bursts through the Earth's surface from below. The above image is particularly notable, however, for the lightning bolts caught near the volcano's summit. Why lightning occurs even in common thunderstorms remains a topic of research, and the cause of volcanic lightning is even less clear. Surely, lightning bolts help quench areas of opposite but separated electric charges. One hypothesis holds that catapulting magma bubbles or volcanic ash are themselves electrically charged, and by their motion create these separated areas. Other volcanic lightning episodes may be facilitated by charge-inducing collisions in volcanic dust. Lightning is usually occurring somewhere on Earth, typically over 40 times each second.

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WOW!! Ya won't find anything like that on mars

Dust in a wheat or sugar silo can spark and cause an explosion and fire. It has happened.

So, roiling dust and gases rising quickly may produce the same phenomena, I have no doubt.

Nice Picture.

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Beyond wrote:WOW!! Ya won't find anything like that on mars

Well not any longer, Beyond. just think about being there at Olympus Mons, back when it was going off, and seeing it from space, or another high mountain, so you would have a better view. Must have been spectacular...or at least, I imagine it so...

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It is VOLCANUS the volcano monster, with its Lightning Eye, and headed for Tokyo. But LOOK, in the distance, is coming, GODZILLA, to fight the fiery, gas and dust enshrouded monster......Oh....SORRY....been watching my Godzilla movies again.....sorry....


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Awesome phenomena!

This great photgragh makes me wonder if lightening occurs on the sun during it's outbursts. I recall the video of a "plasma rain" but don't recall any lightening.

I think I see Benshaming Furankuran flying his rakkaku dako up on the mountain side. Probably my imagination.

Tszabeau wrote:This great photgragh makes me wonder if lightening occurs on the sun during it's outbursts. I recall the video of a "plasma rain" but don't recall any lightening.

Lightning occurs when large charge transfers heat a mainly neutral gas, ionizing it along the path the charge moves along. The Sun is a plasma body, where the gases are already ionized. Certainly, there must be some massive charge transfers occurring at times, but no lightning.

This is an amazing picture. Mr. Rietze's "alien landscapes" website offers many more photos and videos. But I couldn't find any information about how far he was from the volcano to get these images. Some pictures like this one are close-ups but others show the whole mountain, so he much have been quite a distance away. Anyway I guess you wouldn't want to get too close to an erupting volcano, unless you're Harry R. Truman.

A terrible beauty is born (Yeats)

No apod makes me happier than one with both lightning and a volcano... talk about a triple whammy when you throw in some stars.

My all-time favorite: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120730.html

WHOA, That is awesome

TODAYS BLACK HOLE LINK, is coming here again...something wrong....

Er....guess it is a BLACK HOLE LINK......LOL...pulled me over here.

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