Strange purple lightning in the cloud

A photographer captured this strange purple lightning bolt shooting from the top of a thunderstorm cloud in Australia.

Strange purple lightning strikes from the top of the cloud. Photo: Jeff Miles.

Photographer Jeff Miles captured the image of purple lightning on top of a cloud near the small town of Pilbara, Western Australia, according to the Sun. The lightning has a striking color against the dark blue sky turning to night.

The rare phenomenon is called ionospheric lightning. This type of lightning usually forms in thunderstorm clouds that cause heavy rain, and it occurs at much higher altitudes than regular lightning.

Ionospheric lightning often occurs in clouds that produce a lot of rain. Photo: Jeff Miles.

"Giant ionospheric lightning bolts have only been captured on camera a handful of times, and tonight I was lucky enough to see six," said Miles.

The Earth's atmosphere still holds many mysteries. Some of the natural phenomena that occur there are so strange that many scientists are not even sure they exist.

Earlier this year, a European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut captured footage of red sprites and blue jets in Earth's atmosphere.

Danish astronomer Andreas Mogensen used a super-sensitive camera on the International Space Station (ISS) to capture kilometer-wide flashes of blue light above a thunderstorm in the Bay of Biscay.

According to VNE