THE EARTHQUAKE.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXX, Issue 5439, 24 June 1929, Page 2

THE EARTHQUAKE.

PECULIAR LIGHTS.

ST. ELMO’S FIRE ?

The reports of peculiar lights being visible during the recent earthquake will probably be scientifically explained, and put down to electrical disturbances. Some time ago people living in Colorado Springs, near’ the foot of the famed Pike’s Peak, were startled to observe what appeared to be blue flares on the snowclad summit of the mountain. At first it was thought they were distress signals. They disappeared one night only to reappear the next. An airplane hovered over the peak, but learned nothing. The mystery was cleared up by scientific diagnosis—the flares were negative discharges of electricity from the atmosphere to the earth, popularly known as St. Elmo’s fire. If the discharges had been positive they would have beta red. Thunderstorms and heavy snowstorms often caused St. Elmo’s, fire. The discharges are from the ■air- to any point, as the masts of a shjp., a steeple, a tree, points of rock, even the outstretched fingers of the hand. Often the discharge makes a sizzling or crackling sound. The phenomenon is identical, electrically, with the brush discharge of electricity in the laboratory. Sailors christened this phenomenon “St. Elmo’s fire.” Observing it from the tips of mjasts or other parts of the ship, they regarded it as a visible sign from their patron saint, St. Elmo — an Italian corruption of the name of St. Erasmus. British sailors borrowed the name “corposant” for this phenomenon, which comes from the Italian (<r Portuguese) “corpo santo,” holy body» or from the Latin “corpus sancti,” '.iody of a saint. St. Elmo's fire appeal’s sometimes single, sometimes double. It has many nicknamets. Double, sailors often cal! it Castor and Pollux, the names of the twin star:;. Pliny i-ecoixls this in his “Natural History.” Single, St. Elmo’s fire has been called simply Castor, or Helena, the latter being the name of the sistetr of Castor and Pollux. The double corposant, or Captor and Pollux, signifies to sailors the end of a storm. .Helena, or the single corposant, may be an unlucky sign.