Missle launched in cali. And were it from or going? no one knows.

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http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20101109/od_yblog_upshot/no-one-seems-to-know-where-mysterious-missile-launched-near-la-came-from
There is a few videos on the site also
"
Nothing like an unexplained missile launch to ruin a perfectly good coastal sunset.

That was the unsettling reflection that many residents in the Los Angeles area were forced to entertain Monday evening as they gazed out over the ocean and into the storied Southern California sky. All at once, the vista was disrupted by a large missile streaming across the horizon. Nor were area residents especially comforted when they consulted local news outlets about the episode, only to learn that no one seemed to know to whom the missile belonged.

A KCBS traffic helicopter captured the projectile on camera last night, but the Navy and Air Force claimed to know nothing of any planned launch when contacted by KFMB, a CBS affiliate in San Diego.

[Related: Rewind video: Mystery object over Manhattan sparks UFO frenzy]

"We put in a lot of calls to the Navy and Air Force tonight," the station's Marcella Lee said. "But so far, no one seems to know anything about this launch."

"It's spectacular. It takes people's breath away," former U.S. Ambassador to NATO and former Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Ellsworth told the station after viewing the video. Ellsworth could offer little in the way of speculation about the projectile's origins, beyond supposing that it looked to be an American show of force, but he did classify it as "a big missile." Various reports say that the missile was launched roughly 35 miles out to sea, west of L.A. and north of Catalina Island.

The Defense Department so far seems caught as off-guard by the episode as everyone else; a spokesman for the Pentagon told reporters that the whole incident is, at this point, completely "unexplained." Meanwhile, NBC's Jim Miklaszewski — the network's Pentagon correspondent — reported today that missile launches are rarely done in the vicinity of large metropolitan areas. And if military leaders had planned a missile launch, they would have given area residents plenty of advance notice.

[Cruise drama leaves 4,466 stranded at sea]

Earlier today, officials from the North American Aerospace Defense Command issued a statement saying that the missile posed "no indication of any threat to our nation," adding that "from all indications this was not a launch by a foreign military."

Fox News asked around at all the local Air Force bases as well as the FAA and got the same basic response."

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End of the world time. Glad I'm building a bomb shelter out of my truck lol.

[superyota]

 
what a joke.  now they are saying it was a plane flying away and it was an optical illsuion.  sounds like the gov is trying to keep something  .  we'll never know

[Stocker]

Well, if you were the guy who accidentally fired a missile (or the guy in charge of the first guy) would you admit it, or deny any knowledge of what happened? I also heard the story about a jet contrail / optical illusion, but it looked like a missile to me.

I wonder how many people have missiles just sitting around?

[superyota]

the latest news update on this.............. http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20101110/od_yblog_upshot/experts-think-that-california-mystery-missile-was-merely-a-plane
Experts think California 'mystery missile' was merely a plane
          Surely by now you've heard about the "mystery missile" that darted across the Southern California sky. Military officials and other federal authorities don't appear to have a clue as to what the flying object could have been. But some outside experts have a simple explanation for the uproar: What appeared to be a projectile spreading across the sky in the video was simply a contrail, the plume of smoke that airplanes typically leave in their wake.

(UPDATE: The Pentagon is now also saying that it was a plane.)

"This thing is so obviously an airplane contrail, and yet apparently all the king's horses and all the king's men can't find someone to stand up and say it," John Pike, a defense and aerospace expert, told the Washington Post's John Pomfret. Pike noted that the projectile was moving much slower than a missile would, adding that "there's a reason that they're called rockets."

Here's how Pomfret laid out Pike's case for the contrail theory:


It looked like a missile launch, he said, because of an optical illusion that made the contrail appear as though it started on the ground and zoomed straight up. In reality, he said, the contrail began on the horizon and ran parallel to the ground.


"It was an unusually clear day," he said. So what looked like a missile launch 35 miles off the coast of Los Angeles was actually the contrail of a jet that stretched 300 miles into the distance, he said. "At the end of the day, you really have to go with the simplest explanation," he added.

Pike is not alone in that assessment.

Harvard astronomer Jonathan McDowell told New Scientist that because a helicopter in flight recorded the video of the incident, it employed a visual angle that distorted the arc of the contrail. That effect was compounded, McDowell maintained, by the distinctive lighting of the sky at twilight--and the net result was a bit of an optical illusion.

"What isn't clear to me is whether anyone but this helicopter saw it," McDowell said. "If it's coming over the horizon, straight at you, then it rises quickly above the horizon. You can't tell because it's so far away that it's getting closer to you -- you'd think it was just going vertically up."

[Photos: Mystery object over Manhattan sparks UFO frenzy]

In a blog post titled "It Ain't No Thing," arms control guru Jeffrey Lewis agreed: "The short explanation is that we don't see a lot of jet contrails head-on, especially from the vantage point of a helicopter. So, it looks like a missile to everyone else, including former Deputy Secretaries of Defense. But it probably isn't."

Nor, it seems, is this the first time that a jet contrail has triggered anxious speculation about a mystery in the heavens. There is, indeed, a website called Contrail Science devoted to explaining the visual quirks of contrails -- while debunking some of the wilder theories about what's going on up there.

Below is physicist Michio Kaku on the airplane theory (courtesy of ABC News):


and thats the end of that story.  we'll never hear anything more about it i bet

[CruzrDave]

It being called the Catalina Missile Crisis


Most of California has already moved on to other subjects. Today- Polygamy in California(WTF Utah?)

[superyota]

It being called the Catalina Missile Crisis


Most of California has already moved on to other subjects. Today- Polygamy in California(WTF Utah?)

[Sparkplug]

Looks like a plane to me, WAY to slow to be a missle

[Stocker]

Looks like a plane to me, WAY to slow to be a missle

I'm sure you're right.... I didn't see a video, just the still shot from the morning TV news.

[abnormaltoy]

I think it was Pelosi...when she found out she had to move out of the BIG office she just redecorated!

[BoG-ToY]

I was kinda thinking that myself

just a plane makes alot more sense, as well as I think the way our government watches stuff like that, if it was unusual they woulda had a good response..

that or they are testing something and just dont want us to know?

[Rocksurfer]

Eh, I've seen jets go almost straight up so I could see it just being a contrail. In fact if you go to Panamint Valley Days this weekend you will probably get to see just that. The Panamint Valley is used a lot for training since it is so close to China Lake.

[Gamera]

big question explane the flames seen at the sorce of the con trail in the vid

[abnormaltoy]

big question explane the flames seen at the sorce of the con trail in the vid

I'm old. I remember the days of John Glenn, the X-15, the Gemini program and all that crap. I've seen rockets take off from Cape Kennedy and I've seen fighters take off straight up. The "contrail" in the video doesn't look like any I've seen from any aircraft. The smoke, along with the flame and the trajectory, looks more like a rocket to me.

I'm just sayin', I've never seen a billowing contrail.

[Rocksurfer]

  New secret jet. Just remember how much they kept denying stealth jets.

[Stocker]

The "contrail" in the video doesn't look like any I've seen from any aircraft. The smoke, along with the flame and the trajectory, looks more like a rocket to me.

I'm just sayin', I've never seen a billowing contrail.

Well....!!! 

You, sir, were obviously not paying attention when the explanation was given: It's an optical illusion!

Now hush up and drink this here kool-aid...   

[abnormaltoy]

Well....!!! 

You, sir, were obviously not paying attention when the explanation was given: It's an optical illusion!

Now hush up and drink this here kool-aid...   

Mmmm, strawberry...my favorite! 

[Sparkplug]

doesnt look like a flame to me at all, and ive never seen a missle, or any sort of rocket go that slow.