Probably a reasonably reasonable explanation for this… but damn, it’s kinda on the weird side.
Mystery as spiral blue light display hovers above Norway
A mysterious light display appearing over Norway last night has left thousands of residents in the north of the country baffled.
Witnesses from Trøndelag to Finnmark compared the amazing sight to anything from a Russian rocket to a meteor or a shock wave – although no one appears to have mentioned UFOs yet.
The phenomenon began when what appeared to be a blue light seemed to soar up from behind a mountain. It stopped mid-air, then began to circulate.
Within seconds a giant spiral had covered the entire sky. Then a green-blue beam of light shot out from its centre – lasting for ten to twelve minutes before disappearing completely.
Ummm…. huh. Now that’s a hell of a thing.
Watching the videos, to me it looks like a rocket (a Russian rocket, a launch of which was planned), or a payload, was spinning and leaking. That would explain the white spiral, as leaking vapors drift away from the central point in a vacuum. But the blue “beam” is a bit of a stumper.
Other links:
http://www.itromso.no/bilder/article316420.ece
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2764647/Spiral-UFO-puts-Norway-in-a-spin.html
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According to the Russianforces.org blog it was another launch test of the Bulava SLBM that went wrong. Sounds like the 3rd stage had ‘issues’. If there is a program that is snakebit this is it!
http://russianforces.org/blog/2009/12/no_luck_for_bulava.shtml?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+russianforces+%28RussianForces.org+Blog%29
> Sounds like the 3rd stage had ‘issues’.
My guess would be that more than one stage had issues… the white spiral and the blue spiral “beam” seem to be different sources. The white spiral seems to be fairly stationary, while the blue “beam” is under power, going (apparently) down.
Could the blue light be from a tracking laser? The Russians have not made a public statement, but it seems quite likely it was from them, their sub launched missle development site being in that region.
> Could the blue light be from a tracking laser?
Seems exceptionally unlikely. The blue light also demonstrates a spiral patern… helical, to be more exact.
TPS said:
“According to the Russianforces.org blog it was another launch test of the Bulava SLBM that went wrong. Sounds like the 3rd stage had ‘issues’. If there is a program that is snakebit this is it!’
I wonder who they will fire this time? 🙂
At least today its just fired. Back in Stalin’s time it was the firing squad. 🙂
Hey, that’s not fair! Sergei Korolev wasn’t shot, just thrown in jail for six years 😀
In July of 2009 Yury Solomonov resigned as chief designer of the Bulava program, and the Russians said a new chief designer would be appointed by September.
September came and Yury Solomonov was reappointed as chief designer.
From this, I conclude that no one really wants this job, as they know that Bulava is a lemon. 🙂
The Bad Astronomy blog has pretty convincing evidence that it is a Bulava.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2009/12/09/awesomely-bizarre-light-show-freaks-out-norway/
The Russians have admitted to launching a Bulava in that time frame, Cuffy Miggs/John McKittrick has a post up over at http://closingvelocity.typepad.com/closing_velocity/
Cuffy has a clue about these sorts of things!