Bright light in the sky: “It was a rocket launch”

A bright and slightly hazy glow moved in the sky a few minutes before 01:00.

Readers from all over Sweden contacted Aftonbladet with pictures, films and a question about what they saw.

– It was a rocket launch. I am 100 percent sure, says Eric Stempels, space researcher at Uppsala University.

Many Swedes were awake and had their eyes in the sky in the hope of seeing the Perseid meteor shower, which reached its climax during the night towards Saturday.

A few minutes before 01, they were instead able to observe a prolonged, bright glow moving across the sky before disappearing behind the horizon.

– It felt like someone had placed the moon on the other side of the sky. It was like a round globe and was brighter in the middle and it moved fast, says a reader who was near Arlanda.

Aftonbladet received about fifty calls and emails about the light phenomenon in a short time. The pictures are from different parts of Sweden, but show the same thing: A ball of light with what looks like fog around it.

Ken Abraham, 44, was in Haverdal north of Halmstad and was going to watch the Perseids with his mother. When he saw the glow, he attached the mobile phone to a tripod and took a picture with a slow shutter speed.

– The object went in a straight path and had a kind of aura around it. We were stunned. I thought it was a rocket or missile. What the hell have the Russians come up with now, haha.

“Almost got scared”

William Corneliusson, 18, was on an island in the Gothenburg archipelago with two friends when he saw the phenomenon.

– We were out to check on the meteor shower. All of a sudden we just saw that it lit up very brightly. We thought it was a huge meteorite and almost got scared at first. It almost looked like it exploded under it, he says.

On Williams’ film, the time is given as 00:54. It agrees with observations from Eric Stempels at the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Uppsala University.

– I saw it for three or four minutes on my camera. It went from the south, across the east and towards the north, he says.

The scientist: “Be a rocket”

Eric Stempels is absolutely sure of what he saw:

– It was a rocket launch, absolutely nothing cosmic. You see rocket fuel creating a cloud of tiny particles that reflect sunlight. It often looks like a funnel or a triangle.

According to Eric Stempels, there are two stages during the launch in which the rocket may have been seen.

– Either as it enters orbit to release its cargo of satellites or during deceleration to then fall back towards Earth.

Could have been Space X

The time and trajectory in the sky are consistent with a launch of a Falcon 9 rocket by the company Space X made from California during the night of Saturdaysays Stempels.

– It is very likely that it was the rocket people saw. It would send up 46 satellites in different directions and they have confirmed that it was in a polar orbit. It matches what I saw on my camera, he says.

That rocket launches can be seen in the sky is not unique.

– It actually happens all the time, maybe once a month. But normally people lie down and sleep. Now many were out to watch the Perseids.