by iamlucky13 » Wed Aug 23, 2006 8:42 pm
The comment about pollution I could've left out, but the basic concept is that water condensation requires something to condense onto...a condensation nuclei. It occurs on dust, but particulate exhaust probably actually assists that. Your comment about pollution and the whiteness of the cloud (indicating it's more water than particulates) brought that to mind. I do agree that the author should've discussed the science revealed by the picture in greater depth.
Regarding the position of the aircraft, looking at the linear perspective, atmospheric perspective (haziness, brightness, etc), and shape of the cloud, I'm not convinced that plane in the picture isn't the one that dropped the flares. I don't know what a C-17's flare capacity is, but each of those "feathers" appears to be left by an individual flare, so it looks like there may be over 50 of them, triggered in two groups, from either two or four banks of flare launchers. They are ejected some distance from the plane, making the overall pattern pretty wide. Furthermore, the whiteness suggests to me that water out of the sky is condensing in the trails of the flares, filling in the empty space with the impressive cloud. On the other hand, in the conditions under which that should happen, you should also see contrails from the C-17's engines...
The comment about pollution I could've left out, but the basic concept is that water condensation requires something to condense onto...a condensation nuclei. It occurs on dust, but particulate exhaust probably actually assists that. Your comment about pollution and the whiteness of the cloud (indicating it's more water than particulates) brought that to mind. I do agree that the author should've discussed the science revealed by the picture in greater depth.
Regarding the position of the aircraft, looking at the linear perspective, atmospheric perspective (haziness, brightness, etc), and shape of the cloud, I'm not convinced that plane in the picture isn't the one that dropped the flares. I don't know what a C-17's flare capacity is, but each of those "feathers" appears to be left by an individual flare, so it looks like there may be over 50 of them, triggered in two groups, from either two or four banks of flare launchers. They are ejected some distance from the plane, making the overall pattern pretty wide. Furthermore, the whiteness suggests to me that water out of the sky is condensing in the trails of the flares, filling in the empty space with the impressive cloud. On the other hand, in the conditions under which that should happen, you should also see contrails from the C-17's engines...