In southern Savonia, between Savonlinna and Joensuu, lies Paasselkä, a lake of which has long been eerie legends of wandering fires that lure curious swimmers down to drown them. In Finnish folklore, these lights also indicated places where treasures were hidden.
The lights of St. Elmo are discharges in the form of luminous beams or brushes, most often appearing during a thunderstorm on tall objects. The lights are named after Saint Elmo, the patron saint of sailors in Catholicism, who sometimes watched these mysterious flashes on their masts. The sailors believed that this was a good sign, bestowing good luck on the way or hope for salvation in a shipwreck.
There are cases when this rare natural phenomenon also occurred in other conditions - for example, on the skin of an airplane flying through a cloud of volcanic ash or in frost during severe snowstorms. On Lake Paasselka, you can witness these strange discharges, sometimes appearing on the water surface, although experts find it difficult to answer how they were formed in this place.