Beam of Light in Escanaba Substation Explosion

sorry i have nothing to contribute, I just felt compeled to say that these are my favorite kind of threads

a reply to: Atsbhct

I think the warmth given from the plant would have no effect on the ice crystals in the air.

Here is a picture of a volcanic light pillar.

CLICK ME

That's no sunset. And that thin red line just above it -- that's not a sun pillar. The red glow on the horizon originates from a volcanic eruption, and the red line is the eruption's reflection from fluttering atmospheric ice crystals.

Clearly this is the war of the world's, quick slow down the camera speed to see the pod being shot into the war machines!

Thanks for the picture and the link!

ETA: I wonder how close the light is to the actual crater (terminology?) of the volcano.

a reply to: Mianeye

There is also a train yard just southwest of the power station. With the lakers off for the season, ore is being moved by rail now. Lots of train traffic.

A light pillar from a passing train isn't too far fetched of an idea.

a reply to: Atsbhct

I would guess right above it, but could be mistaken.

It was a pretty large crater/fissure, still ongoing BTW.

As a Michigander the first thing I thought about when I saw this story was the movie, Escanaba In Da Moonlight. Surprisingly this event wasn't covered very much by the news. Though I did hear an AM radio report about it that cracked me up... They interviewed an "older" sounding lady that owns a local diner about a rash of breaks-ins that happened when the power went out. She said some "kids", probably in their 40's (ha, ha), broke into her restaurant when the power went out. The interviewer asked a few questions about her diner. She gave a couple details & then mentioned that her diner closes at 2pm. He asked why does it close so early? She said "I drink". Ha!

Very interesting could be alot of light focused out at a single point, how I dont know?

If that is a spotlight, it has to be one hell of a powerful spotlight the way it illuminates the clouds. I don't know what it is. I doubt if it is a train light, the powerful train light might do that if it was pointing straight up, they are pretty bright but that would mean it was standing on end.

I don't know what it is. I am sure of that. It is a really neat thing to see a video, S&F

What should we be learning from this? Have food stocked in your home at all times to last at least a few weeks and alternate heat sources to keep your house at least above freezing. Candles or lights are necessary to have. Concentrate on being prepared for all things for a couple of weeks minimum.

I know that some power plants use beams of light to check smoke density in regards to emissions. Could this possibly be related to that? This is simply a guess and I could be way off but I prefer to look for a rational simple explanation of things before exploring less common ideas.

originally posted by: rickymouse
I doubt if it is a train light, the powerful train light might do that if it was pointing straight up, they are pretty bright but that would mean it was standing on end.

No, it doesn't mean the train would have been standing on end. All you really need for light pillars to form is ice crystals in the air. The brighter the light, the larger the pillar.

a reply to: FalafelBallz

I was in Esky the night before deer season started this year. It was concurrent with a full moon too. Great movie.

I was down in Detroit when the explosion happened, but it made the news down there. Just a quick blurb, nothing too in depth.

The real conspiracy here is that a private company has been attempting to purchase the power plant to convert it to biomass power production. The sale keeps falling through and being pushed back for one reason or another, though typically the buyer's financing. Back in mid-January, a couple weeks before this incident, the Esky city council voted to close the plant. The closure was slated to happen this summer.

a reply to: hutch622

Thanks for the help hutch. I actually knew that but I was used to the old way of subscribing and typed the message before I thought about the subscribe button.

Cool light pillar

But I doubt it's anything ominous. Everybody likes to think their town or some random town is something special to warrant sitting in someone or something's crosshairs when we're on sites like ATS. Considering the amount of research we did into the area (we did consider Escanaba as a place to move to, the beauty of that area of the UP is enticing) I very highly doubt it's anything but a light pillar. It's a nice little industrial town, but in the grand scheme of things, nothing particularly knock-your-socks-off special there overall that we could find. It fits the "quiet town" description well, IMO.

a reply to: Nyiah

The beauty is lost today! All the roads are closed!

I'm just hoping all the dogs/mushers on the UP-200 are fairing well.

Edit to add:

Right now these are closed:
US-2 Manistique to Rapid River
M-28 Munising to Marqutte
US-41 Rapid River to Trenary (about half way to Marquette)
M-35 Perkins to Lathrup (a section of the alternate route from Escanaba to Marquette)

Right now Marquette is pretty much cut off from everything south and east of it. A real cause for concern is any trauma. MQT is the only trauma hospital up here. so anyone going into MSTQ or Esky would have to be transported up there. With the winds (gusting from 35-60 mph, depending on location), I doubt the Survival Flight birds are flying. So hopefully everyone stays off the roads and lets the plows do their job!

a reply to: cmdrkeenkid

Oh no doubt, I took a peek at a webcam in Munising earlier today. If they look borderline white-out, I can imagine how much harsher it must be for Houghton or Marquette. Once everything calms down & clears up though, it's going to be a blast for the outdoorsy folks.

originally posted by: mcChoodles

If it's a sub station, what are the other chemicals doing there in such large quantities that the change the color of the clouds?

The first thing that came to mind is a very exotic weapon destroying a facility pretending to be an electrical substation.

What better place to hide a secret facility than a "dangerous" substation plastered with No Trespassing signs.

Down with the Chimera Group. Long live the resistance!

Your statements ring true for me.

They were up to something in that "substation" and they have been taken out by the resistance.

Humanity will be free.

a reply to: Nyiah

Yeah, it's pretty gnarly out. A civil emergency has been declared for the areas around Esky and Houghton. MLive

"DUE TO EXTREMELY DANGEROUS WHITE-OUT CONDITIONS...M-28 BETWEEN HARVEY AND MUNISING REMAINS CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. MOTORISTS AND SNOWMOBILERS SHOULD AVOID M-28. SEVERAL SNOWMOBILERS HAVE ALREADY BEEN STRANDED THIS MORNING. TRAVEL ON OTHER AREA ROADWAYS WILL REMAIN VERY DIFFICULT TO NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE AT TIMES THROUGH TODAY. LIFE-THREATENING CONDITIONS WILL CONTINUE INTO THIS EVENING FOR ANYONE WHO BECOMES STRANDED."

It's not so much snowing here in MSTQ as it is just blowing.

It almost looks as if it is moving the clouds. There's no way that's a spotlight from a train. Or a spot light in general. Maybe after the fact, but not whilst it's spewing different colors and electric ejection.

Light pillar. When you get a big high energy failure like this, you're going to get fire, smoke, and a number of various things being burned to a cinder in the arcs. It would be fun to see pics of what the substation looked like after. I didn't see them the other day, maybe some are up by now.

I would have expected (based on knowing what's in there and having seen a few go up relatively close) red as the oil burned, blue and white from the arc, green from the copper in the windings and orange and yellow from the iron in the core.