FAIRBANKS, Alaska - Early Saturday morning many people across Alaska saw a mysterious glowing spiral moving across the sky in the midst of the northern lights.
“I saw the auroras picking up so went outside to get some pictures with the birch tree,” said Nick Marchuk. “I noticed a bright light northeast coming through the trees so I set up the camera. My first thought was a space anomaly and this was the picture of the year.” It took about six minutes to cross the sky, “it reminded me of a spiral galaxy,” said Marchuk.
When the rocket’s discarded upper stage passed over Alaska, it vented its unused fuel. A bit of spin turned the harmless cloud into a spectacular spiral. William Dimpfl, a senior research scientist at the Aerospace Corporation, explained that the bluish color is “from solar fluorescence from chemicals in the plume. That’s just aluminum oxide that the sunlight is scattering from.” He added, “Aluminum oxide is the chemical formula for sapphires, so what you’re looking at is sunlight scattering off lots of tiny sapphires.”
Wish I had seen this.
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