Photographers in New Zealand have captured striking images of red sprites, one of the rarest light phenomena in the atmosphere, during a night shoot of the Milky Way. The luminous crimson flashes appeared over the Ōmārama Clay cliffs in the South Island on 11 October.
Tom Rae, a New Zealand photographer, was joined by Spanish photographers Dan Zafra and José Cantabrana. They had hoped for clear skies to photograph the galaxy, but instead witnessed what Rae described as an unforgettable event. Cantabrana first spotted a storm brewing on the horizon and suggested they might see red sprites.
While reviewing his images for a Milky Way panorama, Cantabrana discovered he had captured the phenomenon. Rae told the Guardian: “Dan and I just could not believe it – there was a whole bunch of screaming and shouting and all sorts going on in the dark.”
Red sprites are bursts of electrical energy in the upper atmosphere, triggered by thunderstorms. Unlike ordinary lightning, which strikes downwards, they shoot upwards, forming shapes resembling columns, carrots or jellyfish. They last only a millisecond and are rarely visible to the naked eye, but Rae was fortunate: “I happened to be looking directly at one when it happened – just a perfect coincidence.”
Rae, an award-winning nightscape photographer, said capturing the sprites required technical skill and scientific understanding. Zafra described the night as one of the most extraordinary of his life, noting that no other images are known to show red sprites alongside the southern hemisphere’s Milky Way in a single frame.
