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The launch of an Atlas V rocket with a Mexican communications satellite left swirling contrails in Florida’s sky that could be seen as far south as Miami before dawn Friday.
In West Palm Beach, the white streaks stood out clearly in the ink blue of the early morning as the waning gibbous moon still hung high in the sky.
The launch was delayed about 20 minutes after a boat entered a restricted area off Cape Canaveral.
In September, a similar launch that left contrails in the early-morning sky had people in South Florida questioning whether aliens had landed or if the rocket had exploded.
Lyn Chassagne, a United Launch Alliance spokeswoman, said last month there was nothing different about this launch that caused the rocket’s trail to appear so vividly.
“Just the time of day, atmospheric conditions and position of the sun made for a spectacular launch,” she said.
David Zierden, state climatologist for the Florida Climate Center at Florida State University, saw photos of the plume in September and said then that it looked like the exhaust trail extended much higher into the atmosphere than the regular clouds, allowing the plume to catch more of the early-morning sunlight.
“(It's) always a cool thing when we can combine weather, science and rockets,” Zierden said.
WFTV-Orlando contributed to this report.
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