Unraveling the Mystery of Italy's Red Light Ring
A rare sky phenomenon called ELVE, which appears as a massive red ring of light in the sky, was captured by a nature photographer in Central Italy. ELVEs are a type of stratospheric/mesospheric perturbations resulting from intense thunderstorm electrification. The red rings are created when electromagnetic pulses (EMPs) given off by lightning hit Earth's ionosphere. Due to their short-lived nature, ELVEs are normally visible only to satellites orbiting Earth and were discovered just in 1990. Photographer Valter Binotto believes that the ELVE was produced by an EMP generated from a large thunderstorm near Ancona, a city around 174 miles (280 km) southeast of Possagno.