Color TLE images have been captured by Hungarian astronomers in South America

Hungarian astronomers visited Chile in March, 2012 to observe the Zodiac from a noise-free environment. On the night of 21^st March they monitored the horizon towards Argentina to the East where a thunderstorm swept through behind the mountain ridge of Andes.

 

During the night, seven TLEs were caught on camera between 04:52UT and 06:42 UT by applying a series of 8 second exposures and even more have been seen by naked eye. The camera was a Canon EOS 60D equipped with Sigma 18-50 mm lens used at 35mm/ISO2500 then later at 50mm/ISO6400. 

The captured TLEs were all very similar. Representative examples are shown below. The images are courtesy of Károly Jónás.

Camera directions were found by matching the star map with the images in UFO Analyzer. If the top of the diffuse emissions is assumed to lie at a height of 90 km, the visible sections of these events are at 67-90 km. Horizontal extensions of the diffuse tops then were 5.6-6.6 kms.

 

Were these events huge carrot sprites or gigantic jets? Comments are welcome!

Read the original post (in Hungarian) at http://www.idokep.hu/hirek/voros-lidercek-tanca

Bonus: time-lapse video of the Zodiac made by the group of Károly Jónás (no TLEs in this one, sorry :) : http://www.idokep.hu/keptar/album/Astronomia/kep/1080

Can you spot the meteor?