SpaceX rocket launch at sunset wows some stargazers with ethereal ‘space jellyfish’ (photos)

When SpaceX launch two satellites into orbit Friday night from Florida, it lit up the night time sky with extra than simply its fiery engines. 

The twilight launch of two commercial SES satelltes, referred to as O3b mPower 1 and a pair of, on Dec. 16 created good jellyfish-like plume within the night time sky seen to fortunate stargazers from lots of of miles away. The satellites launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket that lifted off from Area Launch Advanced 40 on the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 5:48 p.m. EST (2248 GMT) and was seen from as far-off as North Carolina.

“We had nice views of SpaceX‘s launch of O3b mPower 1&2 tonight and have been handled to an superior twilight impact,” wrote observers at NCSpaceOps on Twitter (opens in new tab), tagging the view as a “jellyfish effect.”

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Ed Piotrowski, the chief meteorologist for WPDE ABC-15 in North Carolina, shared a sequence of photographs by observers on Twitter. 

The photos (opens in new tab), taken from varied places round North Carolina, present gorgeous views of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket at sundown, trailing an enormous, iridescent tail because it soared into space. 

Some observers requested Piotrowski for assist figuring out what they have been seeing within the night time sky.

“Ed Piotrowski, what is that this factor?” requested observer Harrison Santangelo on Twitter (opens in new tab).

One observer, Jermaine Somerset, even reported seeing the launch from the Turk and Caicos Islands within the Atlantic Ocean, over 700 miles (1,100 kilometers) from the Florida launch website, and shared the view in an Instagram post (opens in new tab).

The photographs from North Carolina have been much more placing when contemplating that SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket plunged right into a cloud layer above Cape Canaveral, Florida shortly after liftoff. The view was nonetheless superb to space reporter and photographer Ken Kremer, who captured a long-exposure streak of the launch. 

“60sec vast angle twilight streak! punched into thick overhead clouds by no means to be seen once more!,” Kremer wrote of the launch on Twitter (opens in new tab).

Veteran launch photographer Ben Cooper matched a long-exposure of the sundown launch with a closeup of the second of liftoff in his views shared on Twitter (opens in new tab).

Photographer Michael Seeley captured a similar view (opens in new tab) whereas observing the launch from 14 miles (22 km) away in Cocoa Seashore, Florida. 

SpaceX’s launch of the SES satellites was truly its second rocket flight of the day on Friday. The Hawthorne, California-based firm kicked off the day with the launch of NASA’s new Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite to map Earth’s water like by no means earlier than. 

That mission lifted off at 6:46 a.m. EST (1146 GMT) from a SpaceX pad at California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base. SpaceX photographs of the flight present good views of the launch, in addition to the Falcon 9 rocket’s first stage returning for a touchdown in each nonetheless and long-exposure views. 

SpaceX will launch one other Falcon 9 rocket from Florida on Saturday (Dec. 17) to ship a brand new batch of its Starlink internet satellites into orbit. That mission will launch from Pad 39A of NASA’s Kennedy Area Heart close to Cape Canaveral Area Pressure Station. Liftoff is at 4:32 p.m. EST (2142 GMT). 

You’ll be able to watch SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket launch live online, courtesy of SpaceX. We’ll showcase it on Area.com’s homepage and our preview story. SpaceX’s webcasts sometimes start about quarter-hour earlier than liftoff.

E-mail Tariq Malik at tmalik@space.com or comply with him @tariqjmalik (opens in new tab). Comply with us @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab), Facebook (opens in new tab) and Instagram (opens in new tab).