Physics of auroral phenomena : proceedings of the 33rd Annual seminar, Apatity, 02 - 05 March, 2010 / [ed.: A.G. Yahnin, A. A. Mochalov]. - Апатиты : Издательство Кольского научного центра РАН, 2011. - 206 с. : ил.

Optical phenomena associated with the launch o fa ballistic missile" Bulava" December 9, 2009 9:45 MSK) the angle of the sun dipping below the horizon was small ~ 6 °, which corresponds to the height of the Earth's shadow about 30 km and at enough bright sky the launch was not seen. A large amount of collected observations provided a unique opportunity for a correct assessment of geometrical parameters of the observed phenomena. This work was done in [1]. Figure 3 shows the obtained by the author estimates the size of various segments of the observed phenomena. Fig 2. Composite picture of the development of optical phenomena observed in Norway during the launch the rocket on Jan. 9, 2009, obtained by combining a large number o f photos. The most interesting features of the optical effects that accompanied by the launch of the rocket, are presented: cyan (blue-green) the color of the missile track at altitudes up to ~ 100 km, the development of spiral structure in the region of the separation of the second stage of the rocket, the development of expanding around the location of the missiles "black hole" during the last stage o f the phenomenon. Development o f the "black hole". The most obvious is the last o f listed above effects. Actually there is no "black hole" is not developed. Engine stopped injected substances into the atmosphere just after turning off the third-stage and all the combustion products are ejected earlier, continued to fly apart. The rate of spread is determined by the speed of the combustion products into the atmosphere, their pressure and temperature. Engine injected substances into the atmosphere and injection velocity may be 2-3 km / sec [2] in normal mode o f the engine in the upper atmosphere. While deviations from normal operation mode exhaust velocity should be considerably less than this value. Development o f a spiral. It is obvious that the spiral structure of gas-dust cloud formed during the third stage booster rocket, linked to its "somersaults", i.e. rotation is not only about its own axis, but also in the plane almost perpendicular to the line of sight. This is evidenced by the form o f clouds, formed by the combustion products of the third stage. It is easy to find (Figure 3) that the compression ratio o f the ellipse formed by the expanding spiral, i.e. ratio o f its minor and major axes is ~ 0.85. This corresponds to the angle between the plane of "tumbling" of the last stage and the direction of the line o f sight from the place of observation ~ 60 °. A probable reason for such a "tumbling" may abort of stages separation. Expansion o f the combustion products is virtually a hemisphere [2, 3], when using o f rocket engines in the upper atmosphere due to the high rate of underexpanded fuel (the ratio o f pressure at the nozzle to the external pressure> 10 5). It is likely that the third stage engine took place in the off-design and products of incomplete combustion of fuel from the engine nozzle due to expire in the form of a dense jet with speeds significantly lesser design because, while expanding spiral and its branches enlarged in the transverse direction. 187