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Pentagon Can't Explain Missile Off California
AOL News ^ | 10/11/10 | Pauline Jelinek

Posted on 11/10/2010 10:59:19 AM PST by Eleutheria5

WASHINGTON -The Pentagon said Tuesday it did not know what created a vapor trail that crossed the skies off the Southern California coast and resembled a missile launch. Video posted on the CBS News website shows an object flying through the evening sky Monday that left a large contrail, or vapor trail. A news helicopter owned by KCBS, a CBS affiliate in Los Angeles, shot the video. Pentagon officials were stumped by the event. "Nobody within the Department of Defense that we've reached out to has been able to explain what this contrail is, where it came from," Pentagon spokesman Col. Dave Lapan said. While the vapor cloud captured on video resembled that created by a rocket in flight, military officials said they didn't know of any launches in the area. Lapan said that "all indications" were that the Defense Department was not involved with the object. One expert called it an optical illusion. "It's an airplane that is heading toward the camera and the contrail is illuminated by the setting sun," said John Pike, director of the U.S.-based security analyst group globalsecurity.org. The North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, issued a statement jointly with the U.S. Northern Command, or NORTHCOM, saying that the contrail was not the result of a foreign military launching a missile. It provided no details. "We can confirm that there is no threat to our nation," the statement said. "We will provide more information as it becomes available."

(Excerpt) Read more at aolnews.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; US: California
KEYWORDS: agitprop; aluminumfoilsale; awe808; california; californiamissile; contrail; missile; mysterymissile; othatmissile; pentagon; tinfoilbrigade; whatmissile
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To: Red Badger
"do you think the Pentagon of WH would tell us the truth?.........."

About what?............

21 posted on 11/10/2010 11:12:47 AM PST by Paladin2
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To: Darkwolf377
Blue UFO outside DC

I missed that, when did that happen?

22 posted on 11/10/2010 11:12:54 AM PST by IYAS9YAS (Liberalism can be summed up thusly: someone craps their pants and we all have to wear diapers)
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To: ClearCase_guy; longjack

Ping to post 10 on this thread


23 posted on 11/10/2010 11:13:43 AM PST by BenLurkin (This post is not a statement of fact. It is merely a personal opinion -- or humor -- or both)
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To: Paladin2

About a missile launch.......


24 posted on 11/10/2010 11:13:43 AM PST by Red Badger (The House finally fell on Nancy Pelosi..........)
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To: RobRoy

Unless it was a very unusual day why there was only one airplane in the air off the coast of LA pulling a con? Where are the other cons in this very, very busy airspace?


25 posted on 11/10/2010 11:13:50 AM PST by pepperdog (Why are Democrats Afraid of a Voter ID Law?)
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To: RobRoy

I lived in an apartment over looking Point Fermin and Long Beach Harbor and have seen many contrails like this one.

I was perhaps 100 feet above sea level and could see the outline of Catalina Island on the horizon which was 26 miles from where I was.

When I saw the 35 mile reference, I assumed that was the distance to the horizon from the altitude the Helicopter was flying - where the contrail appeared to be emerging from the surface. Part of the illusion.


26 posted on 11/10/2010 11:14:13 AM PST by IamConservative (Our collective common sense; the only thing a 1.5GPF toilet ever flushed on the first pull.)
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To: rahbert

Obama’s crack team lost the launch codes in October and inadertently ordered a launch in November?

I sure feel safe and secure in full confidence that our federal government is securing our unalienable rights to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.


27 posted on 11/10/2010 11:14:33 AM PST by Skepolitic
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To: RobRoy

I saw a few beaut contrails the other day over the South Bay..

the one photo of the trail in question that appears to start at a horizon or close to it, shows a plume that takes a distinct bend to the right, maybe a 30-45 degree adjustment, shortly after it rises into view and then veers right.. not sure how a contrail might do that..


28 posted on 11/10/2010 11:14:55 AM PST by NormsRevenge (Semper Fi ... Godspeed .. Monthly Donor Onboard .. Obama: Epic Fail or Bust!!!)
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To: Poison Pill

>>>Pentagon won’t explain missile off California.

You may be on to something.


29 posted on 11/10/2010 11:15:09 AM PST by Keith in Iowa (FR Class of 1998 | TV News is an oxymoron. | MSNBC = Moonbats Spouting Nothing But Crap.)
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To: Noob1999
> And, I’m sure that the radar systems that blanket each city in the US for aircraft traffic control, and security, have no image; cannot identify the speed; cannot tell the tragectory; and cannot identify the planes transponders; and have no record of a pilot asking for takeoff clearance.

See the trajectory, altitude, flight numbers, etc. here:

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/AWE808/history/20101108/1955Z/PHNL/KPHX

30 posted on 11/10/2010 11:15:16 AM PST by mbarker12474 (If thine enemy offend thee, give his childe a drum.)
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To: RobRoy
I’m also not getting any responses to my messages to the home world.

(rolling eyes) You forgot to put the wet laundry in the refridgerator along with 14.335 ounces of cheddar, loosely wrapped in page 43 of the New York Post from March 14, 1978 (NOT THE 15TH! Remember what happend on Zuvius 4 when you used the 15th????) and kept in an old margarine container full of root beer. How many times we have to go through this? Go do it now, I'll wait... (sigh)

31 posted on 11/10/2010 11:16:00 AM PST by Darkwolf377 ( Mm, your tears are so yummy and sweet!Oh, the tears of unfathomable sadness! Mm-yummy! --E. Cartman)
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To: Eleutheria5
Initially it looked like a Trident launch down the western missile range to splash down at Kwajelein.

But all the mumbo jumbo and denials make me wonder if it was a ChiCom sub in our waters rattling a very large sabre.

32 posted on 11/10/2010 11:16:13 AM PST by The Sons of Liberty (Psalm 109:8 Let his days be few and let another take his office. - Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin)
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To: Eleutheria5

Not believable!


33 posted on 11/10/2010 11:16:49 AM PST by ColdOne
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To: Eleutheria5

Breaking News!!!

It was a super king-size Vapor E-Cigarette;)


34 posted on 11/10/2010 11:18:24 AM PST by sodpoodle (Despair; man's surrender. Laughter; God 's redemption.)
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To: Eleutheria5

Pentagon...now confirms aircraft.....

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/world/Pentagon+says+vapor+trail+from+aircraft+missile/3807925/story.html


35 posted on 11/10/2010 11:20:36 AM PST by winoneforthegipper ("If you can't ride two horses at once, you probably shouldn't be in the circus" - SP)
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To: Eleutheria5

absent any intelligent explanation, I’m voting that it’s agitprop.


36 posted on 11/10/2010 11:21:41 AM PST by the invisib1e hand (every bad idea once seemed good to someone.)
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To: NormsRevenge
degree adjustment, shortly after it rises into view and then veers right.. not sure how a contrail might do that..

The prevailing winds will do that. I see bent contrails all the time here in the Albuquerque area. You can even watch the aircraft that leave them flying straight as a rail.

I'm not getting into the "Missile vs. Airplane" debate, just clarifying what happens to these contrails. Another thing about them, if the aircraft is flying at the same altitude, the contrail will hit the horizon at some vantage point due to the curvature of the earth. The ocean gives no vantage point.

One thing I noticed is the "base" of the contrail in question here is not really any wider than a spot farther up on the contrail, or more specifically, the spread of the contrail is fairly even and linear. It's all relatively thick. In the several pictures posted here of contrails from missiles launched out of the water, there is a huge deviation of the contrail/exhaust just above the surface level (a reverse mushroom). This is not present in the video from Monday.

37 posted on 11/10/2010 11:23:43 AM PST by IYAS9YAS (Liberalism can be summed up thusly: someone craps their pants and we all have to wear diapers)
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To: Skepolitic

He thought they said “lunch”.


38 posted on 11/10/2010 11:27:03 AM PST by jazminerose (o)
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To: mbarker12474

You flight path for Flt808 is well south of the area


39 posted on 11/10/2010 11:28:45 AM PST by Robe (Rome did not create a great empire by talking, they did it by killing all those who opposed them)
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To: Eleutheria5

Let me just say that I sure as heck hope that this was a contrail of a jetliner.

But if it was, it would be fairly easy to establish. And so far as I know, there has been no linking of the contrail with a jetliner either arriving or departing from LAX.

On the other hand, RADAR from LAX did not record an object in the area, and statements from NORAD also claim that no object was detected.

The DOD has stated that their was no intentional or inadvertent launch of a missile by any branch of the armed forces in the area.

But when I look at that video, that darn sure looks like a missile in flight.

I sure do hope, for the sake of this country, that the DOD is not lying, for whatever reason, about what they know.


40 posted on 11/10/2010 11:29:26 AM PST by mojito
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