L.A.’s Mystery ‘Missile’ Is Probably a Jet

[n2doc]

By Noah Shachtman

That mystery “missile” launched last night off of the coast of Los Angeles? It probably wasn’t a missile at all, several leading defense analysts say.

The various arms of the U.S. military scrambled this morning to explain the creepy footage, snapped by a CBS news helicopter, of what appeared to be a missile flying into the air, not far from Los Angeles. U.S. Strategic Command, Northern Command, Air Force Space Command, Air Force Global Strike Command, the Navy and the Missile Defense Agency were all left struggling to give an answer for what appeared to be a rogue ICBM. But to GlobalSecurity.org director John Pike, there’s an easy explanation: “It is obviously an airplane.”

“The aircraft is flying towards the observer; the air over the Pacific is clear, so the contrail is visible all the way to the horizon. This creates the optical illusion of a rocket flying up, rather than the actual situation of an airplane flying horizontally,” Pike tells Danger Room. “The object generating the contrail is moving too slowly to be a rocket; the contrail is not expanding as the ‘rocket’ gains ‘altitude’ — which would be the case as the exhaust plume expanding into less dense high altitude air.”

MIT astronomer Jonathan McDowell tells New Scientist pretty much the same thing. Although he does note that the Navy owns a missile target and launch facility at nearby San Nicolas Island.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/11/mystery-missile-is-probably-a-jet/

[slackmaster]

1. An airplane flying TOWARD the camera

That's what I've been saying from the beginning.

:kick:

[Orsino]

2. This is my first look at the footage...

...and I think it's obviously an airplane. Looks similar to actual contrails I've watched, though this one's more foreshortened than any I ever noticed.

edit: And it should be easy to correlate this sighting with a commercial flight.