OK, I’ve had an interesting morning and I got a couple questions out of it.
Last night I was out on the balcony watching a thunderstorm roll in, checking the lightning display and counting the seconds till the thunderclap. At one point, and I have a wife and stepdaughter as witnesses, I saw blue and green lightning. Not whitish-blue like most is, but honest-to-Cecil indigo and green. Mrs. O says it was just because of the distance and the cloud cover/rain in midair that the light had to travel through. Seems to me there might be more behind it. Anyone got any ideas?
This morning I checked out a story on msn.com about a find of Greco-Roman era mummies in Egypt. The archaeologist heading up the dig noted the presence of powdered hematite in one tomb and said it “pricked his chest like a thousand thorns”. What gives with that? Not that I think inhaling hematite is a good idea or anything, but what kind of effect does it have inside or outside the human body?
Lightning is white, but because of atmospheric conditions it can appear to be a different color if it is far away. See What color is lightning
A damn eerie sight follows after lightning strikes an electrical transformer. See blue-green glow. This happened a good mile from my house a couple of years ago and I swear to god my first thought was that the space aliens were finally coming to get me.
Hematite is nothing more than iron oxide. Due to it’s blood red color (in it’s powder form) it makes a good pigment. I’m guessing that’s why it was in powder form in the tomb, for use in the afterlife. I can’t imagine how iron oxide, even in powdered form, could have an effect like you describe. There are places on the net which still sell powdered hematite for use as a pigment - “http://www.uintahred.com/products.htm”, for example. Some American Indians in and around Utah still “grind their own” from raw ore. Hard to believe all this would be going on if it stung like a thousand thorns.