Astronaut Aboard the ISS Captures a Gigantic Jet on Camera

Being 250 miles away from Earth provides astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) with some incredible views. But it also allows them to document happenings best seen from above. Astronaut Nichole Ayers, who is in orbit as part of the SpaceX Crew-10 mission, captured a rare phenomenon known as a gigantic jet on camera during a storm over North America.

NASA defines gigantic jets as a discharge that occurs between some thunderstorms and the Earth’s ionosphere high above them. “They are an unusual type of lightning that is much different from regular cloud-to-cloud and cloud-to-ground lightning,” they add. Gigantic jets are one of the known Transient Luminous Events (TLEs), which also include other elusive phenomena like sprites, halos, and ELVES—a dim, expanding red glow in the night sky.

Ayers captured the gigantic jet as the ISS went over Mexico and the U.S. on the morning of July 3. To get this image, she used a Nikon Z9 using a 50mm lens (f/1.2, ¼ sec, ISO 6400) she had set up in the Cupola to capture a time-lapse image. “In this photo, the storm appears to be hovering near the Texas-Mexico border,” Ayers said. “You can spot the glow of Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, and Houston to the northeast, and Torreón, Mexico, to the southwest.”

At first, due to its appearance, Ayers believed the mysterious lightning shooting upward to be a sprite, which are also very rare and enigmatic. “Some sprites tend to dance over the storms, turning on and off one after another,” NASA says. “Many questions about how and why they form remain unanswered.” TLEs are so poorly understood that even NASA has set up a citizen science project to gather as much footage as possible for further study.

Fellow astronaut Don Pettit, who is well-known for taking and sharing mind-blowing images from the ISS, praised Ayers for her insightful image. “To record a photo like this takes skill to set up the camera but more than that, the knowledge of what lightning systems are likely to create sprites and the willingness to take 2000-5000 images where only one will record a sprite,” he wrote. “Kudos to Nicole for her imagery efforts!” To which Ayers replied, “Trying to make you proud! Couldn’t get pictures like this without your willingness to teach and share knowledge with everyone.”

With how little is known about gigantic jets, sprites, and other TLE, Ayers hopes that this picture will help understand these phenomena better. To stay up to date with the astronaut, make sure to follow Nichole Ayers on X.