Jakarta –
What looks like a glowing whirlpool in the shape of a spiral galaxy appears briefly in the Hawaiian night sky. What is that thing?
Before any speculation, experts confirmed that the amazing spirals were frozen rocket fuel ejected during SpaceX’s launch.
A video of the subtle glow captured January 18 by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan’s (NAOJ) Subaru-Asahi Star Camera and Japan’s Asahi Shimbun news agency, shows small wisps of light stretching into a luminous whirlpool that moves across the sky for several minutes before fading.
“The spiral appears to be related to the launch of SpaceX company’s new satellite,” wrote a NAOJ representative, quoted by Live Science.
The SpaceX launch in question was a Falcon 9 rocket that successfully lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida at 7:24 a.m. EST (1224 GMT) and carried a new GPS satellite for the US Space Force.
The rocket’s first stage, which provides the main propulsion for liftoff, separates from the payload carrier’s second stage about three minutes after launch and finally returns to Earth.
After separating from the first stage, the second stage uses its small engine to propel its own body into position to deploy the satellites. After the satellite is deployed, the remaining fuel is then ejected before re-entering, which causes the second stage to enter a loop before stopping orbit and crashing to Earth in the Pacific Ocean.
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Photo: Subaru-Asahi Star Camera
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This process produces a spiral-shaped cloud of frozen fuel crystals, which are illuminated by sunlight, according to Spaceweather.com.
This isn’t the first time a SpaceX rocket has put on a dazzling light show. In April 2022, the Subaru-Asahi Telescope caught a shimmering spiral of light after SpaceX launched a spy satellite into orbit on another Falcon 9 rocket.
As a result, sights called “SpaceX spirals” became commonplace in the Pacific, as this is where most of the Falcon 9 rocket’s stages fall back to Earth.
Frozen rocket fuel has also created some other visually stunning anomalies in other parts of the world. In March 2022, frozen fuel from a Chinese rocket created a large rotating ball of light that photographed the aurora borealis over Alaska.
In October 2017, an even larger blue orb was seen in the sky over Siberia. At that time, a Russian military rocket was being tested so that it left frozen fuel in the area.
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