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Odd spiral appears amid northern lights in Alaska night sky

  
Via:  Buzz of the Orient  •  last year  •  6 comments

By:   Mark Thiessen The Associated Press

Odd spiral appears amid northern lights in Alaska night sky
 

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Odd spiral appears amid northern lights in Alaska night sky

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In this photo provided by Christopher Hayden, a light baby blue spiral resembling a galaxy appears amid the aurora for a few minutes in the Alaska skies near Fairbanks, Saturday, April 15, 2023. (Christopher Hayden via AP)

ANCHORAGE, ALASKA -  

Northern light enthusiasts got a surprise mixed in with the green bands of light dancing in the Alaska skies: A light baby blue spiral resembling a galaxy appeared amid the aurora for a few minutes.

The cause early Saturday morning was a little more mundane than an alien invasion or the appearance of a portal to the far reaches of the universe. It was simply excess fuel that had been released from a SpaceX rocket that launched from California about three hours before the spiral appeared.

Sometimes rockets have fuel that needs to be jettisoned, said space physicist Don Hampton, a research associate professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute.

"When they do that at high altitudes, that fuel turns into ice," he said. "And if it happens to be in the sunlight, when you're in the darkness on the ground, you can see it as a sort of big cloud, and sometimes it's swirly."

While not a common sight, Hampton said he's seen such occurrences about three times.

The appearance of the swirl was caught in time-lapse on the Geophysical Institute's all-sky camera and shared widely. "It created a bit of an Internet storm with that spiral," Hampton said.

Photographers out for the northern lights show also posted their photos on social media.

The rocket took off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California Friday night with about 25 satellites as its payload.

It was a polar launch, which made it visible over a large swath of Alaska.

The timing of the fuel dump was timed correctly for visibility over Alaska. "And we got that really cool looking spiral thing," he said.

While it looked like a galaxy going over Alaska, he assures it wasn't.

"I can tell you it's not a galaxy," he said. "It's just water vapor reflecting sunlight."

In January, another spiral was seen, this time over Hawaii's Big Island. A camera at the summit of Mauna Kea, outside the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan's Subaru telescope, captured a spiral swirling through the night sky.

Researchers have said it was from the launch of a military GPS satellite that lifted off earlier on a SpaceX rocket in Florida.


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Buzz of the Orient
Professor Expert
1  seeder  Buzz of the Orient    last year

Comments are subject to this group's RED BOX RULES which can be accessed by clicking on this link -> or by clicking on this group's avatar at the top right of the article page above, either of which will take you to this group's home page.

 
 
 
Buzz of the Orient
Professor Expert
2  seeder  Buzz of the Orient    last year

A person is bound to consider that to be damned strange if they didn't know what it actually was.

 
 
 
Kavika
Professor Principal
3  Kavika     last year

Pretty mundane, excess fuel and I was expecting something much more mysterious.

 
 
 
Buzz of the Orient
Professor Expert
3.1  seeder  Buzz of the Orient  replied to  Kavika @3    last year

Me too - what a letdown.  jrSmiley_1_smiley_image.png

 
 
 
Perrie Halpern R.A.
Professor Expert
3.1.1  Perrie Halpern R.A.  replied to  Buzz of the Orient @3.1    last year

It was still fun.

 
 
 
Buzz of the Orient
Professor Expert
3.1.2  seeder  Buzz of the Orient  replied to  Perrie Halpern R.A. @3.1.1    last year

I was hoping Klaatu and Gort were returning to vaporize all weapons of war.

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