Magnificent lights over Sweden likely caused by rocket fuel: tour operator
Tour guide operator and founder of Sweden’s Lights Over Lapland, Chad Blakley, says what was originally thought to be an unidentified flying object over Abisko National Park turned out to likely be a fuel trail from a rocket launched from California.
After investigating, and with the help of amateur space weather enthusiasts, he said the anomaly was likely due to an Atlas V rocket that had blasted off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, United States, several hours earlier carrying the Worldview 4 satellite to orbit.
“We started getting reports from people reading this website that they believe it had been a cloud from the rocket fuel had been dumped from an Atlas V rocket,” Blakley said.
Lights Over Lapland caters to tourists who travel to the Arctic to photograph and film the northern lights auroras.
“I have to admit you are standing out in a frozen area in the Arctic, you’re looking up in the sky you see what appears to be something you can’t explain, it does have a tendency to take your mind to very interesting places,” Blakley said.
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