Bright lights puzzle Piha residents

TVNZ

Just saw this on my morning teletext check and looked it up on the net to see if any one had a photo of it... seems they did.

Now where I live we have a large degree of air traffic, and I see vapor trails created by high (and some times not so high) air craft all the time, especially around sunset, and they are often impressive as long thin strings of white and gold.

The thing is... that photo is NOTHING like an air craft vapor trail at sunset (unless the pilot was drunk). Not to mention the witnesses mention an 'explosion'. Now while the astronomer mentions vapor trail and im only assuming hes talking about air craft vapor trails since ive never heard the term used to describe a weather phenomena other than a jet stream, in which case why not just call it a jet stream so depending on what he means by that (or how the journalist interpreted what the guy said) I could be wrong in thinking what hes describing as the source... although dont forget the 'explosion', even though the witnesses dont specifically mention they heard it, then again that could be simply from the fact the news piece is so small.

Granted its a simple piece with little to go on, but I found it interesting since its from my neck of the woods so I thought id post it.

What do others think?.. easily explained or possibly something different... it sure isnt a vapor trail from an aircraft and to my eyes its far to structured to be a natural forming 'cloud' or similar weather phenomena which is why I posted it here.

This is pretty weird, I've never seen anything like it.

Yea those definately are not vapor trails. I work around military and civilian aircraft everyday and I have never see vapor trails like that. Great find!!

Looks like this UFOs reported near George Bush's ranch....

The problem is that wasn't at night, so the astronomers theory is blatantly wrong.

reply to post by BigfootNZ


BigfootNZ.....

Here is the photo & article embedded for convenience:

Bright lights puzzle Piha residents

Published: 10:20PM Friday April 02, 2010
Source: ONE News


[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/b6c15376d7c9.jpg[/atsimg]

A mystery explosion in the sky has kept residents at a West Auckland beach guessing.

Piha residents describe seeing what looked like trails of fire falling from the sky.

But an astronomer says there's a simple explanation for the strange sight. Alan Gilmore from Canterbury University told ONE News vapour trails at sunrise and at sunset are a very common thing.

He says they attract a lot of attention because they are so bright and unusual looking and because they are in the sunshine while people seeing them are in semi darkness.

The orange glow lasted in the sky for around 20 minutes.

My "first pass" thoughts are that I agree with the explanation of the astronomer.

It is a contrail that has been disturbed by high velocity wind &/or turbulence, as illuminated by a "low angle" sun.

The abrupt "start - stop" of the contrail is due to the differing conditions (e.g. moisture content of the air, etc...) at those points in the plane's path, as covered many, many times by Ozweatherman.

It has also been shown many times that if the plane is still producing a contrail in such a picture, very often the plane is not visible in the photo or video.

DepthOfField has posted some remarkable photos showing how the appearance of such planes can take on very strange & rapidly changing apperances, as the angle of illumination changes.

You can get anything from a "complete plane", to an "orb", to a "cluster of pinpoint lights", etc...

There have been many threads on ATS regarding this exact topic.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...&colorshift=yes

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Kind regards
Maybe...maybe not

[edit on 2-4-2010 by Maybe...maybe not]

Originally posted by Smell The Roses
Looks like this UFOs reported near George Bush's ranch....

The problem is that wasn't at night, so the astronomers theory is blatantly wrong.

Interesting event that GWB ranch one.

I dont think the astronomers explanation is wrong, its just that he calls it a vapor trail, without saying (or the article mentioning) what he means by that. If he means its a funny high altitude cloud, why is it so defined into parallel trails. If he means its an aircraft vapor trail then why is it so short and abrupt and curved, with no aircraft visible (which it would be under those light conditions, either as a noticeable black spot or an impressive reflective flare).

If it was an aircraft vapor trail why is half of it clear, the other half diffused. Air currents can do that but again its nothing like the aircraft vapor trails im familiar with which are extremely long and usually tapered gradually spreading out and going fuzzy the further back you follow them. To me id say it looks like a trail where something went down to the right turned on a dime and went back along the same path. The fuzzy diffuse part is either the start or the end. Look at its scale or how it appears to be scaled its to small to me to be effected like that from air currents if the back was diffused by wind, why is the front (right) portion still so crisp?

No idea if the trail was made by an object or not, since theres no evidence there was... but the vapor trail is there, and it is unusual.

Not sure what sort of local news paper Piha has, or weather its online. Ill try to find something more. It might be mentioned on either of the 3 evening news programs tonight, but ill probably be out around that time. This sort of thing tends to get only a minor mention in NZ news.

Edit:- Found a snipet at the local Piha 'Village Voice' website that mentions the Astronomers name.

But an astronomer says there's a simple explanation for the strange sight. Alan Gilmore from Canterbury University told ONE News vapour trails at sunrise and at sunset are a very common thing.

ONE news might have it as a segment tonight, think ill start the tape recorder before going out ... also looking at that i think he is talking about them being aircraft vapor trails... in which case, bollocks to his theory

Edit2:- Thinking a bit more on it 'Maybe-Maybenot' , it is possible it could be a vapor trail, need to see the entire image to see what sort of angle its being viewed at personaly. If it was the viewer looking down the length of a vapor trail that was low on the horizon then , yes it could be an aircraft's vapor trail... damn it for inconveniently cropped images!

Also thanks for posting the image i would have but not sure about legality and prefer to link to the site directly.

[edit on 2-4-2010 by BigfootNZ]

Vapor trails at sunrise/sundown can be very beautiful.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/e5e92a656109.jpg[/atsimg]

Yeah looking at that id say its pretty much a Vapor trail then viewed from down its length, just a pretty nicely defined one.

Had a few nice and long high altitude vapor trails tonight out over the horizon and was going to take a few pics of them to show as to how I see them most of the time, but my brother had the digital camera

Dont get to many ones directly over head or in line with the viewer and the horizon out here hence why I thought the articles one was something else. but id say now it was 99% aircraft vapor trails.

Originally posted by BigfootNZ
Dont get to many ones directly over head or in line with the viewer and the horizon out here hence why I thought the articles one was something else. but id say now it was 99% aircraft vapor trails.

BigfootNZ.....

Yes.....a contrail.....

But a very odd looking one!

Now we need another NZ UFO case

Kind regards
Maybe...maybe not