Strange Blue Lights in the Sky: What Do They Mean?

First in Morocco, and now in Japan: more and more reports are emerging of mysterious blue lights in the sky shortly before earthquakes occurred in these regions.

A video shared recently on social media in Morocco shows a private house in a quiet neighborhood with mysterious flashes that thousands have already reported.

What do these lights mean? Scientists call them 'sudden electrical discharges', which are byproducts of rock cracking. "Before earthquakes, hundreds of thousands of cubic kilometers of rocks are under pressure, and these stresses cause mineral grains to shift," says Friedman Freund, a researcher studying these 'earthquake lights' for years, in an interview with CNN.

While many seismologists have yet to reach a consensus on the mechanism causing these lights, according to Freund, the earthquake lights are produced by 'stressed' rocks, creating what he describes as an 'electric explosion'. John Derr, a retired geophysicist from the U.S. Geological Survey, agrees, stating that these earthquake lights are "definitely real". In 2014, Derr and colleagues published research suggesting these lights are a relatively rare earthquake phenomenon, mostly occurring away from tectonic plate boundaries.

Robert Thériault, a geologist from Quebec who also participated in the intriguing research, believes these lights could be 'keys' to predicting earthquakes. "These lights vary in shape and extent," he explains. "As scientists, we observe that most earthquakes where these lights appear have magnitudes above 5 on the Richter scale. Sometimes it starts with glowing, spherical masses, either stationary or moving. Sometimes they look like flame-like illuminations emerging from the ground, and at times they appear in the atmosphere. Combined with other parameters that change before seismic activity, earthquake lights might one day help predict an approaching major earthquake," he concludes.

Video documented in Morocco:

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Video documented during the earthquake in Japan:

And how do these blue lights appear to artificial intelligence in both Morocco and Japan? Amazing:

More like a meteor shower than earthquake lights, but still...