Photo: Lightning strike
There are many mysteries associated with lightning. One of them is the strange patterns that appear on the skin of people exposed to a lightning discharge. This phenomenon has already received its name - keranography
There have been hundreds of reports of lightning tattoos in the last 100 years alone. Here is one of the most recent stories from Canada in 2008. Pierre B., a wheelchair user, took refuge under a tree during the rain.
Lightning struck quite unexpectedly (the cloud, according to eyewitnesses, was quite small) and passed along the trunk half a meter from Pierre. When the frightened invalid was transported to the house, then on his chest, under his T-shirt, they found a red-purple image of a branch with leaves, which were imprinted to the smallest detail. However, after 30 minutes, the pattern began to blur and soon only a red spot remained of it.
This episode is very characteristic of the phenomenon of keranography. Such an image appears only on the skin of a person or animal (and never on "inanimate" surfaces, such as fabric or metal), often under clothing (that is, its origin is clearly not optical), and does not last long - several hours or even minutes … The drawing itself is something that a person sees at a given moment, or something that is in close proximity to him.
The phenomenon of keranography has been known since ancient times. The Arabian writer of the 9th century Masudi in his book "Golden Meadows and Mines of Precious Stones" gives a case when a thunderstorm threw lightning directly into the thick of a fierce battle. The warrior, who was struck by lightning, had a drawing on his forehead: the eyes of his opponent goggling out in pain, whom he at that moment pierced with a sword.
A thief branded by a thunderstorm
In the 19th century, the famous French astronomer and popularizer of science, Camille Flammarion, collected reports about ceranography. Of the dozens of episodes available in his piggy bank, one of the most reliable, confirmed by trustworthy witnesses (including police officers), is the case that occurred in the summer of 1865 with the Viennese doctor Drendinger.
Getting off the coach and entering the hotel, Dr. Drendinger found his beloved tortoiseshell wallet inlaid with a metal monogram in the form of two intertwined letters "D". It was not possible to find the thief in hot pursuit. A few days later, the doctors were summoned to a person struck by lightning. He survived, but was unconscious. Drendinger recognized the victim as one of his fellow travelers, who were traveling with him in the stagecoach. The doctor's amazement increased when he found a red tattoo in the form of two “Ds” on the patient's chest - exactly the same as on the wallet. The tattoo repeated all the smallest curls of the monogram, even a scratch familiar to Drendinger was imprinted on the corner of one of the letters. The shocked doctor asked those around him if they had found a tortoiseshell purse with the patient. The answer was yes. A lightning bolt transferred the image of letters to the victim's chest, branded him as a thief!
Cases from the Flammarion dossier
In the 1840s in the province of Camargue (France), lightning passed next to a boy who was stealing eggs from a bird's nest in the rain. Branches, a nest and a bird fluttering over the nest were clearly imprinted on the child's chest.
In the same place, in France, near a woman who was leading a cow in a thunderstorm, lightning struck several times. Arriving at the house, the hostess found on the side of the cow her own portrait, rendered with the utmost clarity. And in the evening, when she began to undress, the woman's husband saw an image of a cow on her back! It was already vague, but still pretty clear.
In Pennsylvania (USA), lightning killed two blacks who were trying to hide under a tree from a thunderstorm. On the chest of one of the victims was captured "… an absolutely reliable photograph of a corner of nature where lightning overtook the dead," writes Flammarion. - Trees, bushes, a house in the distance and even thickets of ferns were depicted on the skin so clearly that the witnesses of this incident, armed with a magnifying glass, could see the smallest details …”. The “photo” began to fade and blur only four hours later, so more than fifty people managed to verify the fact of its existence.
Of the events of the 20th century, the Yugoslav case of 1944 was widely known. The lightning that struck the chestnut killed four soldiers who were hiding under it from the storm. Two hours later, the doctor, examining the corpses, found a number of cranographic images on their skin. On various parts of the bodies of the dead, red-purple drawings of chestnut branches with leaves were imprinted.
On the banker's belly - stock price
Ball lightning was also the "culprit" of ceranography. Flammarion describes an incident with a major merchant Auguste Lecoq. On a June evening in 1878, Lecoq was sitting at the window of his house in the suburbs of Paris and reading the Stock News. A thunderstorm was raging outside the window. Suddenly, after one of the very close discharges, the merchant saw a ball of lightning, which was rapidly flying straight to his window. It seemed that she was about to crash into the glass. It was too late to flee, and the frightened businessman only impulsively closed himself off from her with a newspaper.
The flaming ball, however, flew past. Lecoq took a deep breath, got up from his chair and headed into the other room. On the way, he looked at himself in the mirror and … was numb with horror. His face and neck were printed with typographic text! The lines and letters were so distinct that they could be read. Taking off his shirt, Lecoq found the continuation of the text on his chest. It fully captured the stock price announced that day …
A resident of Tambov, Antonina I., reported on the involvement of ball lightning in the emerging "tattoo". "On August 14, 1982, I was vacationing at the dacha," she told the editorial office of one of the Moscow newspapers. - The day was cloudy, but warm, and my son and I went to the river. My little son was swimming, and I stayed on the shore. About 40 minutes later, I felt a vague uneasiness, and then a sudden heat began to blow over me. At that moment, I noticed redness on my hand in the form of a poplar leaf print (I was sitting just under it). Looking up, I saw a pale pink ball hanging over the tree. He seemed to sense me, because when I raised my eyes to him, he immediately jumped off the spot and flew away. By evening, the redness disappeared, but the white outline of the leaves remained for a long time. Only by 1988 half of it seemed to melt, but the other half was still noticeable. All these years, the hand was as if electrified, sparks flew out of the fingers in bundles."
Are the tracks leading to UFOs?
For the science of the 19th century, such drawings on the skin of people seemed to be an absolutely incredible thing. But this phenomenon today is an insoluble mystery, it is not for nothing that it is placed next to such phenomena as clairvoyance, levitation, out of body, automatic writing, telepathy, necromancy, and so on.
Nevertheless, some experts are trying to find a scientific explanation for ceranography. For example, the episode with Dr. Drendinger's purse. The appearance of a metal monogram imprint on human skin, in their opinion, can be explained by the combined action of two factors: high electric potential and intense microwave radiation. The latter evaporated metal particles from the monogram, and a strong field transferred the ions of this metal to a grounded conductor, whose role in this case was played by a person. The same effect is possible with printing ink (the case of Lecoq). However, this version raises questions, and most importantly, does not explain the overwhelming majority of cases of keranography, when images of trees, leaves, people and even entire landscapes are imprinted on the skin.
Therefore, it is not surprising that ufologists are mainly interested in the phenomenon, especially since ball lightning appears in a number of episodes - objects considered by some UFO researchers to be intelligent beings or formations created by aliens. And in the episodes where ordinary lightning became the cause of ceranography, ufologists see signs of the presence of "plates". For example, in the episode with Pierre B. there was a single small cloud in the sky, which broke out with almost a single lightning, directed exactly at the tree under which the victim was. This chain of accidents suggests that an alien ship was hiding in the cloud, which sent a special beam capable of applying a "tattoo", which seemed to the observers and Pierre himself as a thunderstorm.
The same can be said about the case of the woman and the cow. "Lightning" struck several times next to this pair, without causing both visible harm, which in itself is incredible. Maybe there was a UFO in the clouds above them, which fired at the animal and the owner with its rays, which left portraits on their bodies? In general, signs of the presence of UFOs can be found in almost all episodes of ceranography, if viewed under a close ufological magnifying glass.
True, then the question remains: why did the aliens need to put on the bodies of people (most of whom died in this case) short-lived images of twigs and leaves? What did the aliens want to tell us with this demonstration?
Igor V0L03NEV
Secrets of the XX century № 40 2010