Glowing Night Clouds May Be An Unexpected Side Effect Of Rocket Launch
Space launches, particularly early morning space launches, cause spectacular glowing clouds to appear in new places, according to new research published in the journal Advancing Earth and Space Science. About 50 miles (80 kilometers) above the ground floats the tallest clouds in Earth’s atmosphere. Called noctilucent, mesosphere, or polar mesosphere clouds, these crystallized pools of water vapor are high enough to reflect sunlight, even after sunset or even before sunrise. Because of their position in the upper atmosphere, when they are present at the right time, noctilucent clouds (i.e. “night rays”) sparkle with otherworldly light. They can make the sky at dusk or dawn look like the surface of the sea on a clear day — silvery ripples of light between patches of darkness. “You see it for about 30 minutes to an hour and a half after sunset, or before sunrise,” Cora Randall, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and one of the researchers on the new study,