Illustration of St. Elmo's fire on a ship at seaSt. Elmo's fire on the flaps and flap track fairings of anA350 while going through a cumulonimbus
St. Elmo's fire (also calledcorposant,Hermes fire,furole,witchfire orwitch's fire)[1] is aweather phenomenon in which luminousplasma is created by acorona discharge from a rod-like object such as amast, spire, chimney, or animal horn[2] in an atmosphericelectric field. It has also been observed on the leading edges of aircraft, as in the case ofBritish Airways Flight 009, and by US Air Force pilots.[3]
The intensity of the effect, a blue or violet glow around the object, often accompanied by a hissing or buzzing sound, is proportional to the strength of the electric field and therefore noticeable primarily duringthunderstorms orvolcanic eruptions.
St. Elmo's fire is named after St.Erasmus of Formia (also known as St. Elmo), thepatron saint of sailors. The phenomenon, which can warn of an imminentlightning strike,[4] was regarded by sailors with awe and sometimes considered to be a good omen.[5][6]
St. Elmo's fire is a reproducible and demonstrable form ofplasma. Theelectric field around the affected object causesionization of the air molecules, producing a faint glow easily visible in low-light conditions. Conditions that can generate St. Elmo's fire are present during thunderstorms, when high-voltage differentials are present between clouds and the ground underneath. A local electric field of about100 kV/m is required to begin a discharge in moist air. The magnitude of the electric field depends greatly on the geometry (shape and size) of the object. Sharp points lower the necessary voltage because electric fields are more concentrated in areas of highcurvature, so discharges preferentially occur and are more intense at the ends of pointed objects.
Thenitrogen andoxygen in the Earth's atmosphere cause St. Elmo's fire tofluoresce with blue or violet light; this is similar to the mechanism that causesneon lights to glow, albeit at a different colour due to the different gas involved.[7]
In 1751,Benjamin Franklin hypothesized that apointed iron rod would light up at the tip during a lightning storm, similar in appearance to St. Elmo's fire.[8][9]
In an August 2020 paper, researchers inMIT's Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics demonstrated that St. Elmo's fire behaves differently in airborne objects versus grounded structures. They show that electrically isolated structures accumulate charge more effectively in high wind, in contrast to the corona discharge observed in grounded structures.[10][11]
Researchers at Rutgers University have devised a method to generatevacuum ultraviolet light using different forms of lighting, by employing sharp conductive needles placed within a dense gas, such as xenon, contained in a cell. They achieve this by applying a high negative voltage to the needles in the xenon-filled cell, resulting in the efficient production of vacuum ultraviolet light. St. Elmo's Fire being similar, they believe it could be used as lighting but with a higher power source, thus increasing efficiency by over 50%.[12]
After the medieval period, St. Elmo's fire was sometimes associated with theGreek element offire, such as with one ofParacelsus's elementals, specifically thesalamander, or, alternatively, with a similar creature referred to as an acthnici.[15]
Welsh mariners referred to St. Elmo's fire ascanwyll yr ysbryd orcanwyll yr ysbryd glân ("candles of theHoly Ghost" or the "candles ofSt. David").[16]
Russian sailors also historically documented instances of St. Elmo's fire, known as "Saint Nicholas" or "Saint Peter's lights",[16] also sometimes calledSt. Helen's orSt. Hermes' fire, perhaps through linguistic confusion.[17]
St. Elmo's fire is reported to have been seen[by whom?] during theSiege of Constantinople by theOttoman Empire in 1453. It was reportedly[where?] seen[by whom?] emitting from the top of theHippodrome. TheByzantines attributed it to a sign that the Christian God would soon come and destroy the conquering Muslim army. According toGeorge Sphrantzes,[citation needed] it disappeared just days before Constantinople fell, ending the Byzantine Empire.
Accounts of Magellan's first circumnavigation of the globe refer to St. Elmo's fire (calling it the body of St. Anselm) being seen around the fleet's ships multiple times off the coast of South America. The sailors saw these as favourable omens.[18]
En route toNagasaki with theFat Man atom bomb on 9 August 1945, theB-29Bockscar experienced an uncanny luminous blue plasma forming around the spinning propellers, "as though we were riding the whirlwind through space on a chariot of blue fire."[19]
Among the phenomena experienced onBritish Airways Flight 9 on 24 June 1982, were glowing light flashes along the leading edges of the aircraft, including the wings and cockpit windscreen, which were seen by both passengers and crew. While the bright flashes of light shared similarities with St Elmo's fire, the glow experienced was from the impact of ash particles on the leading edges of the aircraft, similar to that seen by operators ofsandblasting equipment.
St. Elmo's fire was observed and its optical spectrum recorded during a University of Alaska research flight over the Amazon in 1995 to studysprites.[21][22]
Apoy ni San Elmo – commonly shortened to santelmo – is a bad omen or a flying spirit in Filipinofolklore, although the description for santelmo is more similar toball lightning than St. Elmo's fire. There are various indigenous names for santelmo which has existed before the term santelmo was coined. The term santelmo originated from Spanish colonial rule in the Philippines.[25]
In 15th-centuryMing China, AdmiralZheng He and his associates composed the Liujiagang and Changle inscriptions, the two epitaphs of theMing treasure voyages, where they made a reference to St. Elmo's fire as a divine omen ofTianfei, the goddess of sailors and seafarers.[27]
The power of the goddess, having indeed been manifested in previous times, has been abundantly revealed in the present generation. In the midst of the rushing waters it happened that, when there was a hurricane, suddenly a divine lantern was seen shining at the masthead, and as soon as that miraculous light appeared the danger was appeased, so that even in the peril of capsizing one felt reassured and that there was no cause for fear.
— Admiral Zheng He and his associates (Changle inscription)[28]
Mention of St. Elmo's fire can be found inAntonio Pigafetta's journal of his 1519 to 1522 voyage withFerdinand Magellan. St. Elmo's fire, also known as "corposants" or "corpusants" from the Portuguesecorpo santo[29] ("holy body"), is also described inThe Lusiads (1572), the epic account of the voyages of discovery ofVasco da Gama (1469-1524).
Robert Burton wrote of St. Elmo's fire in hisAnatomy of Melancholy (1621): "Radzivilius, the Lithuanian duke, calls this apparitionSancti Germani sidus; and saith moreover that he saw the same after in a storm, as he was sailing, 1582, from Alexandria to Rhodes". This refers to the voyage made byMikołaj Krzysztof "the Orphan" Radziwiłł in 1582–1584.
On 9 May 1605, while on the second voyage ofJohn Davis commanded by SirEdward Michelborne to the East Indies, an unknown writer aboard theTiger describes the phenomenon: "In the extremity of our storm appeared to us in the night, upon our maine Top-mast head, a flame about the bigness of a great Candle, which the Portugals callCorpo Sancto, holding it a most divine token that when it appeareth the worst is past. As, thanked be God, we had better weather after it".[30]
Pierre Testu-Brissy was a pioneeringFrenchballoonist. On 18 June 1786, he flew for 11 hours and made the first electrical observations as he ascended into thunderclouds. He stated that he drew remarkable discharges from the clouds by means of an iron rod carried in the basket. He also experienced Saint Elmo's fire.[31][user-generated source]
William Bligh recorded in his log on Sunday 4 May 1788, on boardHMS Bounty of 'Mutiny On The Bounty' fame:'Corpo-Sant. Some electrical Vapour seen about the Iron at the Yard Arms about the Size of the blaze of a Candle.'The location of this event was in the South Atlantic sailing from Cape Horn, (having failed to round the cape in the winter months), en route to Cape of Good Hope and west of Tristan da Cunha. The log records the ship's location as: Latd. 42°:34'S, Longd (by the time keeper K2) as 34°:38'W.Reference: Log of the Proceedings of His Majestys Ship Bounty in a Voyage to the South Seas, (to take the Breadfruit plant from the Society Islands to the West Indies,) under the Command of Lieutenant William Bligh, 1 December 1787 – 22 October 1788 Safe 1/46, Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW
26 June 1799: At 4 Began to Blow very Hard with Heavy Shower of Rain & Hail and Extraordinary Heavy Clap of Thunder & Lightning when fell a Cormesant [corposant] a Body of Fire which collect from the Lightning & Lodge itself in the Foretopmast Head where it was first seen by our Captain when followed a Heavy Clap of Thunder & Lightning which occasioned it to fall & Burst on the Main Deck the Electrific of the Bursting of this Ball of Fire had such power as to shake several of their Leg not only On the Main Deck as the fire Hung much round the smith Forge being Iron but had the same Effect on the Gun Deck & Orlop [deck] on several of the Convicts. 25 July 1799: We were now sourounded with Heavy Thunder & Lightning and the Dismal Element foaming all round us Shocking to see with a Cormesant Hanging at the Maintop mast Head the Seamen was here Shock'd when a flash of Lightning came Burst the Cormesant & Struck two of the Seamen for several Hours Stone Blind & several much hurt in their Eyes.[32]
While the exact nature of theseweather phenomena cannot be certain, they appear to be mostly about two observations of St. Elmo's fire with perhaps some ball lightning and even a directlightning strike to the ship thrown into the mix.
On Thursday 20th, I was gratified for a few minutes with the luminous appearance described above [viz., "such flashes of lightning from the west, repeated every two or three minutes, sometimes at shorter intervals, as appeared to illumine the whole heavens"]. It was about nine o'clock, P.M. I had no sooner got on horseback than I observed the tips of both the horse's ears to be quite luminous: the edges of my hat had the same appearance. I was soon deprived of these luminaries by a shower of moist snow which immediately began to fall. The horse's ears soon became wet and lost their luminous appearance; but the edges of my hat, being longer of getting wet, continued to give the luminous appearance somewhat longer.
I could observe an immense number of minute sparks darting towards the horse's ears and the margin of my hat, which produced a very beautiful appearance, and I was sorry to be so soon deprived of it.
The atmosphere in this neighbourhood appeared to be very highly electrified for eight or ten days about this time. Thunder was heard occasionally from 15th to 23rd, during which time the weather was very unsteady: frequent showers of hail, snow, rain, &c.
I can find no person in this quarter who remembers to have ever seen the luminous appearance mentioned above, before this season, – or such a quantity of lightning darting across the heavens, – nor who have heard so much thunder at that season of the year.
This country being all stocked with sheep, and the herds having frequent occasion to pay attention to the state of the weather, it is not to be thought that such an appearance can have been at all frequent, and none of them to have observed it.[d]
Weeks earlier, reportedly on 17 January 1817, a luminous snowstorm occurred in Vermont and New Hampshire. Saint Elmo's fire appeared as static discharges on roof peaks, fence posts, and the hats and fingers of people. Thunderstorms prevailed over central New England.[34]
On a second night we witnessed a splendid scene of natural fireworks; the mast-head and yard-arm-ends shone with St.Elmo's light; and the form of the vane could almost be traced, as if it had been rubbed with phosphorous. The sea was so highly luminous, that the tracks of the penguins were marked by a fiery wake, and the darkness of the sky was momentarily illuminated by the most vivid lightning.
InTwo Years Before the Mast,Richard Henry Dana Jr., (1815–1882) describes seeing a corposant in thehorse latitudes of the northern Atlantic Ocean. However, he may have been talking about ball lightning; as mentioned earlier, it is often erroneously identified as St. Elmo's fire:
The observation by R. H. Dana of this phenomenon inTwo Years Before the Mast is a straightforward description of an extraordinary experience apparently only known to mariners and airline pilots.
There, directly over where we had been standing, upon the main top-gallant mast-head, was a ball of light, which the sailors name a corposant (corpus sancti), and which the mate had called out to us to look at. They were all watching it carefully, for sailors have a notion that if the corposant rises in the rigging it is a sign offair weather, but if it comes lower down, there will be a storm. Unfortunately, as an omen, it came down, and showed itself on the topgallant yardarm. We were off the yard in good season, for it is held as a fatal sign to have the pale light of the corposant thrown upon one's face.
Nikola Tesla created St. Elmo's fire in 1899 while testing aTesla coil at his laboratory inColorado Springs, Colorado, United States. St. Elmo's fire was seen around the coil and was said to have lit up the wings of butterflies with blue halos as they flew around.[37]
A minute before thecrash of the Luftschiffbau Zeppelin's LZ 129Hindenburg on 6 May 1937, Professor Mark Heald (1892–1971) of Princeton saw St. Elmo's Fire flickering along the airship's back. Standing outside the main gate to the Naval Air Station, he watched, together with his wife and son, as the airship approached the mast and dropped her bow lines. A minute thereafter, by Heald's estimation, he first noticed a dim "blue flame" flickering along the backbone girder about one-quarter the length abaft the bow to the tail. There was time for him to remark to his wife, "Oh, heavens, the thing is afire," for her to reply, "Where?" and for him to answer, "Up along the top ridge" – before there was a big burst of flaming hydrogen from a point he estimated to be about one-third the ship's length from the stern.[38]
St. Elmo's fire was reported byThe New York Times reporterWilliam L. Laurence on 9 August 1945, as he was aboard a plane followingBockscar on the way toNagasaki.
I noticed a strange, eerie light coming through the window high above in the Navigator's cabin and as I peered through the dark all around us I saw a startling phenomenon. The whirling giant propellers had somehow become great luminous discs of blue flame. The same luminous blue flame appeared on the plexiglass windows in the nose of the ship, and on the tips of the giant wings it looked as though we were riding the whirlwind through space on a chariot of blue fire. It was, I surmised, a surcharge of static electricity that had accumulated on the tips of the propellers and on the dielectric material in the plastic windows. One's thoughts dwelt anxiously on the precious cargo in the invisible ship ahead of us. Was there any likelihood of danger that this heavy electric tension in the atmosphere all about us may set it off? I express my fears to Captain Bock, who seems nonchalant and imperturbed at the controls. He quickly reassures me: "It is a familiar phenomenon seen often on ships. I have seen it many times on bombing missions. It is known as St. Elmo's Fire."[39]
One of the earliest references to the phenomenon appears inAlcaeus's Fragment 34a about the Dioscuri, orCastor and Pollux.[40] It is also referenced inHomeric Hymn 33 to the Dioscuri who were from Homeric times associated with it.[41] Whether the Homeric Hymn antedates the Alcaeus fragment is unknown.
The phenomenon appears to be described first in theGesta Herwardi,[42] written around 1100 and concerning an event of the 1070s. However, one of the earliest direct references to St. Elmo's fire made in fiction can be found inLudovico Ariosto's epic poemOrlando Furioso (1516). It is located in the 17th canto (19th in the revised edition of 1532) after a storm has punished the ship ofMarfisa,Astolfo, Aquilant, Grifon, and others, for three straight days, and is positively associated with hope:
But now St. Elmo's fire appeared, which they had so longed for, it settled at the bows of a fore stay, the masts and yards all being gone, and gave them hope of calmer airs.
— Ludovico Ariosto, 1516
InWilliam Shakespeare'sThe Tempest (c. 1623), Act I, Scene II, St. Elmo's fire acquires a more negative association, appearing as evidence of the tempest inflicted byAriel according to the command ofProspero:
Later in the 18th and 19th centuries, literature associated St. Elmo's fire with a bad omen ordivine judgment, coinciding with the growing conventions ofRomanticism and theGothic novel. For example, inAnn Radcliffe'sThe Mysteries of Udolpho (1794), during a thunderstorm above the ramparts of the castle:
"And what is that tapering of light you bear?" said Emily, "see how it darts upwards,—and now it vanishes!"
"This light, lady," said the soldier, "has appeared to-night as you see it, on the point of my lance, ever since I have been on watch; but what it means I cannot tell."
"This is very strange!" said Emily.
"My fellow-guard," continued the man, "has the same flame on his arms; he says he has sometimes seen it before...he says it is an omen, lady, and bodes no good."
In the 1864 novelJourney to the Centre of the Earth byJules Verne, the author describes the fire occurring while sailing during a subterranean electrical storm (chapter 35, page 191):
On the mast already I see the light play of a lambent St. Elmo's fire; the outstretched sail catches not a breath of wind, and hangs like a sheet of lead.
InHerman Melville's novelMoby-Dick, Starbuck points out "corpusants" during a thunder storm in the Japanese sea in chapter 119, "The Candles".
The phenomenon appears in the first stanza ofRobert Hayden's poem "The Ballad of Nat Turner";[43] it is also referred to with the term "corposant" in the first section of his long poem "Middle Passage".[44]
InKurt Vonnegut'sSlaughterhouse-Five,Billy Pilgrim sees the phenomenon on soldiers' helmets and on rooftops. Vonnegut'sThe Sirens of Titan also notes the phenomenon affecting Winston Niles Rumfoord's dog, Kazak, the Hound of Space, in conjunction with solar disturbances of the chrono-synclastic infundibulum.
InRobert Aickman's story "Niemandswasser" (1975), the protagonist, Prince Albrecht von Allendorf, is "known as Elmo to his associates, because of the fire which to them emanated from him". "There was an inspirational force in Elmo of which the sensitive soon became aware, and which had led to hisSpottname or nickname."
InOn the Banks of Plum Creek byLaura Ingalls Wilder, St. Elmo's fire is seen by the girls and Ma during one of the blizzards. It was described as coming down the stove pipe and rolling across the floor following Ma's knitting needles; it did not burn the floor (pages 309–310). The phenomenon as described, however, is more similar toball lightning.
InVoyager, the third major novel inDiana Gabaldon's popularOutlander series, the primary characters experience St. Elmo's fire while lost at sea in a thunderstorm betweenHispaniola and coastalGeorgia.
It is referenced multiple times in the Urban-Fantasy seriesThe Dresden Files byJim Butcher, particularly when magical beings such as the protagonist's dog are exerting power, especially during conflict, or to describe the visual effects of magic being used.
InLarry McMurtry's Pulitzer Prize-winning novelLonesome Dove (1985), St. Elmo's Fire appears twice during two dramatic thunderstorms on the cattle drive (chapters 31 and 62):
To his amazement he saw that the cattle seemed to have caught the lightning—little blue balls of it rolled along their horns… "Ride off the cattle," he said. "Don't get close to them when they got the lightning on their horns. Get away from 'em".
On the children's television seriesThe Mysterious Cities of Gold (1982), episode four shows St. Elmo's fire affecting the ship as it sailed past theStrait of Magellan. The real-life footage at the end of the episode has snippets of an interview with Japanese sailor Fukunari Imada, whose comments were translated to: "Although I've never seen St. Elmo's fire, I'd certainly like to. It was often considered a bad omen, as it played havoc with compasses and equipment". The TV series also referred to St. Elmo's fire as being a bad omen during the cartoon. The footage was captured as part of his winning solo yacht race in 1981.[45]
On the American television seriesRawhide, in a 1959 episode titled "Incident of the Blue Fire",cattle drovers on a stormy night see St. Elmo's fire glowing on the horns of their steers, which the men regard as a deadly omen.[46] St. Elmo's fire is also referenced in a 1965 episode ofBonanza in which religious pilgrims staying on the Cartwright property believe an experience with St. Elmo's fire is the work ofSatan.[47][48]
OnThe Waltons episode "The Grandchild" (1977), Mary Ellen witnesses St. Elmo's Fire while running through the woods.
In the Western miniseriesLonesome Dove (1989–1990), lightning strikes a herd of cattle during a storm, causing their horns to glow blue.
On the American animated television seriesFuturama episode titled "Möbius Dick",Turanga Leela refers to the phenomenon as "Tickle me Elmo's Fire."
On theNetflix original Singaporean animated seriesTrese (2021), the Santelmo (St. Elmo's Fire) is one of the protagonist's, Alexandra Trese's, allies whom she contacts using her oldNokia phone, dialing the date ofthe Great Binondo fire, 0003231870.
InThe Last Sunset (1961), outlaw/cowhand Brendan "Bren" O'Malley (Kirk Douglas) rides in from the herd and leads the recently widowed Belle Breckenridge (Dorothy Malone) to an overview of the cattle. As he takes the rifle from her, he proclaims, "Something out there, you could live five lifetimes, and never see again," the audience is then shown a shot of the cattle with a blue or violet glow coming from their horns. "Look. St. Elmo's fire. Never seen it except on ships," O'Malley says as Belle says, "I've never seen it anywhere. What is it?" Trying to win her back, he says, "Well, a star fell and smashed and scattered its glow all over the place."
InSt. Elmo's Fire (1985),Rob Lowe's character Billy Hicks erroneously claims that the phenomenon is "not even a real thing."
InThe Hunt for Red October (1990) during a scene where the USS Dallas, a Los-Angeles-class submarine, is attempting to evade a torpedo, the crew discusses the presence of St. Elmo's fire on the sub's periscope.
InThe Perfect Storm, based on the true story of the Andrea Gail fishing vessel, there is a scene where the crew encounters St. Elmo's fire during the height of a storm.
In Robert Eggers's 2019 horror filmThe Lighthouse, it appears in reference to the mysterious salvation that lighthouse keeper Thomas Wake (Willem Dafoe) is hiding from Ephraim Winslow (Robert Pattinson) inside theFresnel lens of the lantern.
Brian Eno's third studio albumAnother Green World (1975) contains a song titled "St. Elmo's Fire" in which guestingKing Crimson guitaristRobert Fripp (credited with playing "Wimshurst guitar" in the liner notes) improvises a lightning-fast solo that would imitate an electrical charge between two poles on aWimshurst high-voltage generator.
^The term was also used for a special wicker basket used at the cult of Artemis at Brauron in Attica.[14]
^Known as 'Castor and Pollux' inLatin;Homeric Hymn 33 describes a generic epiphany of these fraternal heroes, collectively called theDioskouroi, in the midst of a storm at sea. Here they are said to rush through the air "with tawny wings" and to bring relief to terrified mariners.
^It was of high significance that this was during the period of extraordinary atmospheric effects and dramatic reduction in temperatures following an earlier series of massive volcano eruptions that were ultimately responsible for theYear Without a Summer.
^Braid also writes that one of his friends had a similar experience on the evening of the preceding Saturday: in which, his friend reported, he had seen "his horse's ears being the same as two burning candles, and the edges of his hat being all in a flame" (p. 471).
^Eyers, Jonathan (2011).Don't Shoot the Albatross!: Nautical Myths and Superstitions. London: A&C Black.ISBN978-1-4081-3131-2.[page needed]
^Bergreen, Laurence (2003).Over the Edge of the World: Magellan's Terrifying Circumnavigation of the Globe. New York: Morrow.ISBN978-0-06-621173-2.[page needed]
^Van Doren, Carl (1938).Benjamin Franklin. New York: The Viking Press. p. 159. Quoted text from May 1751 letter published inGentleman's Magazine. Excerpt at"Franklin – The Scientist".Archived from the original on 30 April 2001. Retrieved24 May 2019.
^Curd, Patricia, ed. (2011).A Presocratics Reader: Selected Fragments and Testimonia. Translations byRichard D. McKirahan and Patricia Curd (Second ed.). Hackett. p. 38.ISBN978-1-60384306-5.
^Dreyer, Edward L. (2007).Zheng He: China and the Oceans in the Early Ming Dynasty, 1405–1433. New York: Pearson Longman. pp. 148,191–199.ISBN978-0-321-08443-9.
^Tesla, Nikola & Childress, David H. (1993).The Fantastic Inventions of Nikola Tesla. Stelle, Illinois: Adventures Unlimited.ISBN0-932-81319-4.[page needed]
^Robinson, Douglas.LZ-129 Hindenburg. New York: Arco, 1964.[page needed]
^"Devil on Her Shoulder"Archived 26 June 2021 at theWayback Machine,Bonanza (S07E06), originally aired 17 October 1965. Entire episode is available for viewing on YouTube. Retrieved 23 April 2017.
