Israel’s anti-government has gained new momentum as tens of thousands of people spill into the streets of cities across the country to oppose Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s contentious judicial overhaul plan

Pennsylvania's governor says the collapsed stretch of Interstate 95 in Philadelphia will reopen within two weeks

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee, who is presiding over the Georgia election subversion case against former President Donald Trump and 18 other co-defendants, will hold his first hearing Wednesday afternoon amid questions of how soon a trial could begin.

Theater fans, mark your calendars: This season’s Tony Awards will take place on June 16 at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City

With the tragedy and horror wreaked in Morocco last week, it's unsurprising that people’s focus hasn’t been on the skies. And yet, Friday’s devastating earthquake, has also sparked renewed interest in a mysterious aerial phenomenon. Footage shared to social media just moments before the 6.8-magnitude tremor struck the High Atlas mountains appears to show blinding lights flashing across the sky. Experts have suggested that the jaw-dropping sight is evidence of an enigmatic natural occurrence called “earthquake lights”. Reports of these bright flashes go back centuries. And yet, very little is known about them, to the point that scientists aren’t even sure they’re real. Indeed, some experts have concluded that there isn’t sufficient proof to support their existence, the United States Geological Survey notes. Nevertheless, “people have wondered about them forever," Karen Daniels, a physicist at North Carolina State University, told the New York Times. "It's one of those persistent mysteries that hang around and never quite get nailed." The issue with studying earthquake lights is that since earthquakes are impossible to predict, so are any preceding celestial pyrotechnics. Not knowing when or where they will occur means researchers can’t preemptively install the necessary equipment needed to detect them. Essentially, the only evidence we have comes from eyewitness accounts and, more recently, video recordings. And there is an abundance of the former, with a 2014 study noting that aerial luminous phenomena were reported in relation to 65 earthquakes which occurred in Europe and America over a period of 200 years. These descriptions of earthquake lights vary in their details, with some recalling on-and-of lightning-style flashes, and others minutes-long glows of different colours. “All of these have been reported by observers,” John Ebel, a seismologist at Boston Collegel told the NYT. “Which ones are actually true, and which ones are products of their imagination, we can’t really say.” One theory behind the formation of earthquake lights is that they are the result of friction between tectonic plates generating electricity. However, most experts are unconvinced by this hypothesis, including Dr Daniels. She told the NYT: “Rock on rock is not a situation where people have been able to generate large charge separation. And so it just doesn’t seem like a very good explanation for what people see.” Other scientists have suggested electrical arcing from power lines shaken by earthquakes could be responsible for the sky flares. But Dr Daniels acknowledged it’s still possible that there’s no link at all between the lights and tectonic events. “We’re comforted by things that we can understand, and we’re scared by things we don’t,” she pointed out. “I think that’s part of the reason we’re so fascinated by this phenomenon.” Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

The Senate has passed a massive annual defense bill that would deliver a 5.2% pay raise for service members and keep the nation’s military operating

GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Nigeria Plc, the second-biggest drug firm in the West African nation, will cease operations after its

The Mega Millions jackpot has risen to an estimated $720 million after no winning ticket was sold — again

The case of a Missouri doctor whose body was found in an Arkansas lake more than a week after he was reported missing remains shrouded in mystery

A showdown between Ecuador’s President Guillermo Lasso and the opposition-led National Assembly could result on either side being booted out of office before the end of the week

Rex Heuermann's house in Massapequa Park aroused suspicion due to its run-down nature despite his work as an architect

A new report says there was a "sharp increase" in violence at abortion clinics in 2022, the year when Roe v. Wade was overturned, ending the federal right to an abortion. A disproportionate increase occurred in states that protect abortion rights, according to the National Abortion Federation, a professional association for abortion providers.