See the Odd Spiral Appears Amidst Northern Lights in Alaska Night Sky

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People who like to watch the Northern Lights in Alaska saw something special recently: A spiral shaped light that was a baby blue color, like what you might see from far away galaxies! It was really beautiful, and it only lasted for a few minutes.

What had happened early Saturday morning was caused by a SpaceX rocket that launched from California around three hours ago. This rocket released a bit too much fuel which created the spiral everyone saw.

Space physicist Don Hampton explained that sometimes rockets have to get rid of some extra fuel, and this must have been one of those times.

Fuel from airplanes can turn into ice when they are flying high up in the sky. On clear nights, this ice may look like a big, swirly cloud in the sky if it’s reflecting sunlight while the ground is dark. Although this isn’t very common, some people have seen this happen around three times.

Recently, a rocket launch happened at the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. This launched 25 satellites into space that made it visible across Alaska! Photos of this were taken with the Geophysical Institute’s all-sky camera and shared widely. Lots of people on social media also posted pictures they took of the northern lights show too! It was such an awesome sight that it actually caused an Internet storm.

When the airplane released fuel, it happened at the right time and it was visible in Alaska. The way it looked from down below actually made it seem like there was a galaxy passing overhead, but the pilot said this wasn’t true. He stated that what we were seeing was just water vapor that was reflecting the sunlight – not a galaxy!

At the beginning of the year, people in Hawaii’s Big Island saw an amazing spiral in the night sky. Photos taken at a telescope on Mauna Kea helped capture this moment. Scientists say that the spiral was caused by a military GPS satellite launching from Florida on top of a SpaceX rocket.