During an electronic music concert at the Horizon Music Festival, held in San Diego, a spectacular luminous figure, similar to a giant “space jellyfish”, appeared above the heads of the spectators. The video and the explanation of the suggestive phenomenon, which made the event even more unforgettable.
Credit: Craig A. Harris / Screenshot Facebook
There evening of the June 24th in the sky of San Diegoduring the electronic music concert Horizon Music Festivala huge and incredible appeared “space jellyfish“, a luminous phenomenon closely related to that observed the evening before in Italy. Around 9.30pm on Sunday June 23, 2024in fact, a strange aura had appeared in the South, the origin of which was soon revealed: the launch of a rocket Falcon 9 Of SpaceXthe private aerospace agency of Elon Musk.
The Images of the curious light they have flooded the social networks, often accompanied by comments requesting an explanation. In a short time it was possible to associate the phenomenon with the lift-off of the mission Starlink 10-2 Of SpaceXwhich occurred at 7.15pm Italian time from Space Launch Complex 40 of the Space Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The return trajectory of the second stage of Falcon 9, which successfully released dozens of Starlink satellites in thelow Earth orbit (LEO), was visible from Southern Italy, which is why many were lucky enough to admire the light show.
What was visible from Italy, however, was not in the slightest comparable to the magnificent phenomenon they were able to witness the following day from California and, in particular, from the great metropolis of San Diego overlooking the Pacific Ocean. In the sky of the city, as shown by the images shared on Facebook, X, TikTok and Twitter, the aforementioned “space jellyfish” has indeed appeared, thanks to the departure of another SpaceX Falcon 9. The second launch, scheduled a few hours after the one from Cape Canaveral, took place at 8.47pm PT on June 23rd (5.47am on June 24th in Italy) from the Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) of the space station Vandenberg in California.
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The timing and location made the launch – also set to release Starlink satellites – a breathtaking spectacle, especially for those attending theHorizon Music Festival of San Diego, an annual event dedicated to electronic music in which the world stars of the genre participate. Precisely from here came the most suggestive images, in which the space coelenterate manifested itself on the heads of thousands of cheering spectators, among green and white laser beams, smoke effects and loud music. A “gift” from Elon Musk that they will hardly forget.
But why did this spectacular ethereal shape form in the sky? The basic reason is the same as the luminous phenomenon observed on the evening of June 23 from Italy. Simply put, it’s about the exhaust gas free yourself from the rocket engine nozzle; they are gases subjected to very strong pressure which, once released into the external environment, suddenly tend to expand to enter equilibrium with that of the atmosphere. During this process they draw spectacular spirals or precisely “space jellyfish” (even if they look more like coelenterates called crinoids) depending on the observation angle. The same event occurred on May 5, 2022 in the sky of the southern USA.
The reason why these luminous phenomena are not always visible lies in the time. When launches happen at sunset or toSunrisein fact, the exhaust gases are illuminated from below; it is precisely this detail that makes them appear before our eyes. The fact that in California they saw such a spectacular structure and in Italy only a series of halos depends on the angle of observation and the launch phase. To date we have had to “make do” with small phenomena linked to rockets launched from abroad, such as the strange light of the M51 missile launched from France in November 2023. Nothing to do with the sensational sequence that embellished the festival at Waterfront Park in San Diego.
