Something in the air - experiencing St Elmo's Fire!

We've had so crazy experiences in the mountains over the years, but have never experienced the kind of freaky electrical conditions that we did today! Something was quite literally in the air today, involving our hair standing on end, our ice axes humming, but thankfully no bolts of lightning! It's a mountain phenomenon that I have heard of mountaineers experiencing in the Alps, on exposed ridges or peaks, just before a big electrical storm, but never in this country! It was strange, interesting and scary, but all at the same time! 

The day started cold, with our first frost of the year. Because everything is so damp at the minute, the van doors were completely frozen shut!

Van Ice

Believe it or not, we actually chose to try and go surfing in the morning! The wave forecast looked good and although it was cold, there was no wind predicted as well as (potentially) some nice glassy waves. After hanging the wetsuits over the radiators to pre-warm them, we set off, but unfortunately, things weren't as good as promised, so we aborted the surf plan and heading to the hills instead!

Small waves on Anglesey

There has been a descent amount of snow put down in the mountains and we soon found ourselves up in the thick of it, below the mountain of Y Garn in the Ogwen Valley.

Breaking Trail

Initially, the viability was good, with great colours in the valley. The snow was soft and quite heavy, so we didn't need our ice axes or crampons.

Ogwen Valley

As we approached the summit ridge, it began to snow heavily and the clouds came in. That was when the weird stuff started to happen in the air... Clare said she had a buzzing in her ears that she couldn't explain. She asked if I could hear it too? I couldn't, but came over to see if there was something in her ear, like a bug of some sort? As I got close to her, I could hear the noise too, but it seemed to be coming from my rucsac? Clare took off her hat as she was now convinced there was something in or around her head - as she did so, all her hair stood up on end!

Not only could I now hear the humming and buzzing, but my whole rucsac had begun to start vibrating. It was then that I began to realise what might be going on! An electrical storm could be upon us! Ourselves and our ice axes were attracting a massive static charge from the clouds! We needed to descend fast and get somewhere less exposed before a bolt of lightning showed up!

Just before the static storm

It was such a curious experience that I wanted to observe it further, but also wanted to get to safety asap, which is exactly what we did! I couldn't believe that it was happening. Since getting back home I've done a bit of research into the phenomena and we were certainly right to leg it!

"If you find that your ice axe starts hissing and glowing, it is due
to the electrical phenomenon known through the centuries as St Elmo's
Fire. The hissing occurs because the axe attracts thousands and
thousands of volts of static electricity and this static makes its
presence felt by the hissing sound, concentrated at the uncovered
spike of an axe. Should your ice axe radiate a glow, most often
bluish-violet, this faint light is the coronal discharge of the
charged gases in the atmosphere, with an applied electrical force
transforming the gases into a glowing mixture of separate proton
clusters and electrons. This mixture is called a plasma... In theory,
its presence could mean that an electrical strike is highly possible.

However, hanging around to see my ice axe 'radiating a blueish glow' would have been quite a sight!

Descending fast!

Back down by the relative safety of the small lakes, we took time to admire the funky ice formations. The lake was not frozen when we were ascending, so we literally watched it start to freeze as the temperatures took a sudden dive as the storm passed overhead.

Broken Ice re-freezing

Ice Re-forming

Then it was down to the safety of the valley and the comfort of The Cottage, to reflect on our 'experience'!

Heading home