Starship Asterisk*

Atlas V Rising

Explanation: Early morning risers along Florida's Space Coast, planet Earth, were treated to a launch spectacle on September 2nd. Before dawn an Atlas V rocket rose into still dark skies carrying a US Navy communications satellite from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station into Earth orbit. This minutes long exposure follows the rocket's arc climbing eastward over the Atlantic. As the rocket rises above Earth's shadow, its fiery trail becomes an eerie, noctilucent exhaust plume glinting in sunlight. Of course, the short, bright startrail just above the cloud bank is Venus rising, now appearing in planet Earth's skies as the brilliant morning star.

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Gee....if I were up that high, would I be Noctilucent?

Awesome Launch...
:---[===] *

Now THAT's photography. Beautifully done. So... is the "rainbow" a reflection of the arcing rocket trail, in the camera lens or an atmospheric effect?

Tszabeau wrote:Now THAT's photography. Beautifully done. So... is the "rainbow" a reflection of the arcing rocket trail, in the camera lens or an atmospheric effect?

Most likely lens flare. An internal reflection of the launch, moving along its own path, the color determined by the nature of the good- but not perfect- anti-reflection coating used.

do they still do rocket cams, or has that become ho-hum ?

ta152h0 wrote:
do they still do rocket cams, or has that become ho-hum ?

They are probably mandatory.

Was that a staging incident near the peak of the arc? It looks like the first stage continued to follow a perfect ballistic parabola as it headed back to Earth. That appears quite a course correction as the second stage burns. ...Beautiful...C_S

Chris Peterson wrote:

Tszabeau wrote:Now THAT's photography. Beautifully done. So... is the "rainbow" a reflection of the arcing rocket trail, in the camera lens or an atmospheric effect?

Most likely lens flare. An internal reflection of the launch, moving along its own path, the color determined by the nature of the good- but not perfect- anti-reflection coating used.

Agreed, note how if you flip the rainbow feature vertically, then horizontally, it appears like it would line up perfectly with the rocket trajectory.

APOD Robot wrote: its fiery trail becomes an eerie, noctilucent exhaust plume glinting in sunlight.

This plume created quite a stir among early risers on the west side of the peninsula.