SpaceX launch more than 4,000 miles away blamed for glowing spiral in UK skies

The Met Office said exhaust fumes from a rocket launched in Florida caused the glowing celestial display.

A spiral of light in the night sky — The spiral, seen here over Bristol, was visible across the UK and much of Europe (@Noreligion69/X/PA)

A large glowing spiral which lit up the skies over the UK on Monday night is believed to have been caused by a SpaceX rocket launched more than 4,000 miles away.

The growing swirl visible for several minutes across British skies was initially confused with aviation and even extraterrestrial activity by some, but it has now been attributed to a launch at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

Billionaire Elon Musk’s company SpaceX held a launch for the US government shortly before 1.50pm local time (5.50pm GMT) and it is understood the Falcon 9 rocket’s frozen exhaust plume caused the display.

The Met Office said on social media site X: “The rocket’s frozen exhaust plume appears to be spinning in the atmosphere and reflecting the sunlight, causing it to appear as a spiral in the sky.”

The twisting celestial display was visible across much of Europe, with hundreds taking to social media to share footage and imagery.

Dave from Bristol, who did not wish to share his second name, said he initially though the blue spiral was a plane.

“It looked just like a plane with its headlight on,” he told the PA news agency.

“It suddenly went blurry and I thought ‘oh, it’s gone into cloud’, but then realised there weren’t any clouds.

“I watched this fuzzy light for what felt like about a minute when all of a sudden it started shooting out these spiral arms and spinning.

“I realised straight away it was SpaceX because I’ve seen it so much on YouTube, but I can totally see how others would have been weirded out by it – it really did look alien.”

A spiral as seen from the University of Hertfordshire's Bayfordbury Observatory — The spiral as seen from the University of Hertfordshire’s Bayfordbury Observatory (Vaishnav Nhalikkarammal/University of Hertfordshire)

Explaining the phenomenon, Lord Dover, a senior technical officer at the University of Hertfordshire’s Bayfordbury Observatory, said the spiral was visible for around 10 minutes from 7.52pm – moving across the sky before dipping over the horizon.

“(The SpaceX) rocket… dumped fuel in the upper atmosphere to shed weight before returning to Earth,” he explained.

“This fuel formed an expanding, swirling cloud that developed into a giant spiral shape as it travelled over the Atlantic.

“These sightings are becoming common in some parts of the world, but it’s still unusual for rocket launches to be visible like this from the UK.”