Anyone experienced St Elmo's Fire?

[Bustamove]

We used to see it a lot in the venerable A-6 Intruder. The flying chicken bone had a fuel probe sticking out of it's nose right in front of the windscreen (EA-6Bs are still in the Fleet with the same setup). A lot of nights you'd get the blue halo and lightning discharges off the probe's tip. It was usually about the size of a basketball but sometimes bigger and so bright you'd about want to put your visor down. It was great entertainment on a boring tanker mission but a litte more excitement than you need on a bombing run.

 

[FastCargo]

Should we be air refueling...

Had an interesting St Elmos fire story while a new guy in the B-1...

Night mission in South Dakota, with an air refueling. The A/R recepticle sits right in front of the pilots (about 6 feet). You can almost look down to see if the door is open or not. That night there was a lot of cirrus, lots of remnants of T-storms, about 2 miles vis within cloud...did I mention I was a brand new copilot on night checkout?

Anyway, after we get in formation with our tanker, we ease up to the boom, and at about 3 feet, the air between the receptable and the A/R boom tip lights up with multiple electric arcs! Looks like something out of a old sci-fi B movie. You can actually hear the bolts as they cycle between the aircraft. I kind of casually ask if we should continue...instructor says sure... Needless to say, I'm still here, so we didn't blow up or anything. Saw the effect before we connected, and right after disconnect... Amazing!

During the debrief, the instructor says that maybe we shouldn't have pressed the A/R after all. Well, NOW you make that decision (I thought that, didn't say it)!

Funny though, that's about the only time I've seen the effect...

Fly Safe!

FastCargo

 

[JBHewlett]

This sounds interesting

This sounds interesting, but can someone please tell me what St. Elmo's Fire is? Any pictures of it?

J.

 

[Broke in CVG]

Picture of St. Elmos

http://www.pbase.com/jimack/bhm_sav_sav/

 

[njcapt]

One time years ago, I was checking out a new Captain in a Chieftain - flying down the eastern side of Lake Michigan on a cold winter night through some high cirrus. We started to exhibit some St. Elmo's fire on the right windshield which, in this prehistoric model Navajo, had a plexiglass window on the right side. As the fire started to get really big, I pointed to the electrical phenomenon and said, "Hey, Mark, look at that". When my finger got to within four inches or so of the windshield, a HUGE frickin' lightning bolt arced from my finger to the surface of the window. I involuntarily yelled "F*** me", rudely waking up the passengers, as the shock totally deadened my arm up through my shoulder. The other pilot nearly pissd himself laughing at my misfortune. I wasn't as amused with the experience of providing a grounding path for 100,000 volts of electrical charge. My arm still felt numb when I went to sleep later that night.

 

[nosewheel]

Seen it many times. The most awesome display was on the L-1011. The windows are like picture windows and its kind of like watching a big screen TV. If I'm not mistaken there the largest aircraft window made. I could be wrong though...I was wrong once before. The only bad thing about it was we were usually getting the crap beat out of us during the display. The other part of the show sometimes included a thirty foot long fireball shooting forward from the nose of the aircraft and rings of fire around the engine cowlings. It usually gets the passengers a little excited. The neatest thing I ever experienced was when the Co-Pilots front window delaminated at 350 at night while we were all half asleep. When the thing let go there was a very loud BANG !! then it shot a baseball size ball of fire at the FO's face from the lower part of the windscreen where it meets the glaresheild. WOW !! that really woke us up fast.We found out later that it happened when the crack in the windscreen when through the window heat strip and caused the high voltage fireball.The Co-Pilot was quite OK just a little shooken for a few beers.

 

[avbug]

Usually blue, sometimes green, sometimes yellowish, sometimes white or whitish. I've never had a fireball roll down the interior or spark at me, but I'd sure like to see it.

 

[mckpickle]

Had it on rare occasions in the ATR. Mostly COLD winter nights flying high with some really dry snow. Then One time Me and another guy were taking a ATR 72 across the pond to germany. We were to stop in Goose Bay for a final tank up then go direct across the pond at 25,000ft. About 200 miles before goose bay the other guys points at my window and says look. I gave the obligitory "cool" as I noticed the small blue light flashes, and went back to some chart I was reading. Then I thought wait, we are in the clear, no snow and its a nice night, so why..................................................... As i look up the color had changed from irridecent blue to yellow and red as we realized the heating element was arcing. As we reached up to turn it off it sounded like someone let loose a shotgun as the whole window shattered. Thank god it was only the outer pane of glass which we were later told was not structural. We followed the QRH, depresurized and went down to 9000ft. Had it happened mid way over the atlantic......bubye.

 

[Simon Says]

JB Hewlett

St. Elmos Fire is the name of the movie that mysteriously plays on the windscreen of the aircraft. Good flick, but distracting during flight.

 

[Typhoon1244]

Saw it once or twice in the Brasilia. The CRJ will turn out an impressive display climbing through high clouds.

It was pretty interesting for the first couple of minutes...then it got kind of annoying. (Maybe the "magic" is starting to wear off me...)