A strange luminous spiral was observed in the sky of New Zealand

This somewhat worrying phenomenon was caused by the fuel discharge from a SpaceX rocket that put a satellite into orbit on Sunday.

Some are already afraid of a foreign body invasion. On Sunday evening, New Zealanders spotted a strange cosmic phenomenon in the sky. visible from many South IslandIn the darkness, a huge vortex of blue light appeared.

On social networking sites, many Internet users shared photos, wondering about the origin of this phenomenon. Theories abound – from UFOs to alien rockets to commercial light screens.

“Massive spiral galaxy”

“Aliens that acted again”, “black hole” … Then the attempts at interpretations on social networks multiply.

“Cela ressemblait à une énorme galaxie en spirale, juste suspendue dans le ciel, et dérivant lentement à travers (…). Une sensation assez étrange”, a confié Alasdair Burns, un guide d’observation des étoiles surt l’î , to me Watchman.

Alasdair Burns took some long-exposure photos, and picked up an IUD from his phone. “We quickly knocked on all our neighbors’ doors to get them out as well. And so there were about five of us looking up, well, a little scared.”

Unloading fuel from a SpaceX rocket

However, fears or hopes soon faded. It was, in fact, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, launched on the same day from Cape Canaveral in Florida. Its goal: to put the Globalstar satellite into orbit. quoted Watchman“Clouds of this type sometimes occur when a rocket carries a satellite into orbit,” explained Professor Richard Easter, a physicist at the University of Auckland.

When the rocket launched the satellite, it orbited and released a fuel made up of water and carbon dioxide. “It briefly forms a cloud in space illuminated by the sun” and spins, Richard Easter continues.

This isn’t the first time SpaceX has drawn similar reactions. Last April, a mysterious flare phenomenon was observed in the skies of France, also caused by the opening of fuel by a rocket.