An astronaut aboard teh International Space Station captured a stunning image of a shining blue lightning bolt illuminating a cloud from over 400 kilometers above Earth. The photo, taken on July 1, 2025, shows a powerful storm over Milan, Italy.
NASA astronaut Nichole Ayers, who has previously shared striking photos of Earth from orbit, took the sequence of images. She noted the proximity of Milan allowed for a clear view of the storm’s scale.
“For these photos, I was lucky Milan was nearby. This gives us an idea of how large some of these storms and lightning can get,” Ayers wrote on X.
Capturing such an image is challenging. Ayers has been aboard the ISS as part of SpaceX Crew-10 for nearly a year, consistently documenting phenomena visible from space. Her work provides a unique viewpoint on Earth’s weather patterns.
See more of Ayers’ photography here and learn more about NASA here.
