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A video of an incredible aerodynamic phenomenon at a recent rocket launch. The real fun starts at about 1:50 in:
(alt = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SsDEfu8s1Lw)
There's some discussion of it on this Metafilter thread. It gets a bit confused, including the usual tedious pseudo-geek response of "if I don't understand it it must be fake" so I've added a comment explaining what is going on, and why the 'ripples' seem to be travelling outwards far faster than sound. (It's an illusion; what we are seeing is a very shallow conical shock wave from a barely-supersonic rocket intersecting the flat layer of ice crystals that is responsible for the sundog.)
(alt = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SsDEfu8s1Lw)
There's some discussion of it on this Metafilter thread. It gets a bit confused, including the usual tedious pseudo-geek response of "if I don't understand it it must be fake" so I've added a comment explaining what is going on, and why the 'ripples' seem to be travelling outwards far faster than sound. (It's an illusion; what we are seeing is a very shallow conical shock wave from a barely-supersonic rocket intersecting the flat layer of ice crystals that is responsible for the sundog.)
