Posted on 12/12/2010 10:47:16 AM PST by Brian Kopp DPM
California contrail: Four conflicting eyewitness reports
One month after the KCBS video purporting to show a missile contrail off the coast of California went viral, a heated debate over what exactly created the contrail persists. Experts have offered convincing analysis supporting the theory that the contrail represents an SLBM launch, while internet pundits have assembled a formidable collection of evidence that the contrail was created by UPS flight 902. The debate is seemingly at an impasse, and it might be a good time to step back from the intense data analysis and review the basic facts of November 8, 2010.There are two known eyewitnesses who captured images of the contrail. Gil Leyvas is the helicopter camera man for KCBS in Los Angeles who videotaped the contrail and Rick Warren lives on Long Beach and photographed the contrail from his tenth story balcony. A 50 minute phone interview with Leyvas was obtained for this report and discussed further via email, and Warren was also contacted by email.
According to Leyvas, his video was obtained while filming a sunset view for a KCBS weather report. As he was filming, Leyvas noticed an object on the horizon that appeared to be climbing vertically out of the ocean, and he zoomed in on the object. He videotaped the contrail for a total of ten minutes and subsequently continued to view the contrail for an additional ten minutes. Leyvas maintains that the object itself that created the contrail only remained in view for two to three minutes. For 30 to 45 seconds, the object glowed brightly and then seemed to disappear from view. His initial impression was that the object was traveling east towards the coast. On reviewing the video later, he had the impression the object may instead have been heading away from the coast, towards the northwest.
The highly unusual appearance of the sunset contrail shown on TV and posted online, combined with Leyvas perception that the object creating the contrail only remained in view for two to three minutes, constitutes the primary basis upon which many observers believe the object was a Sub Launched Ballistic Missile.
Rick Warren wasnt sure what the object was that he was photographing on November 8th. I was shooting with a telephoto lens and looking through a viewfinder so I never really saw the separation of the object and the contrail until I looked at the photos, but Im sure that this whole thing lasted way too long to be a missile. I see lots of contrails from my 10th floor balcony but the difference in this one was that it seemed to be going up.
Having seen many contrails, what stood out for Warren was the vertical nature of the contrail, not that it looked like a missile exhaust plume. Some of his photos of the contrail were posted on the local ABC7 website, and were utilized by Mick West of Contrailscience.com to create a composite image of the flight progression of the object. The time stamps on Warrens photos were used to establish that the object creating the contrail remained in view for 4 minutes 43 seconds in Warrens photos. Based on altitude and position, the object first appeared in Leyvas video at least five minutes prior to Warrens photos. After seeing Wests analysis of the images, Warren says, Im now of the opinion that it was indeed a plane."
At this point, one of the most glaring discrepancies between these eyewitness accounts must be addressed. Most observers looking at Warrens images agree that the small dark object which appears at the top of each of his later photos is the same craft creating the plume that was seen in his earlier photos as well as that which was seen in Leyvas video.
If the object that created the contrail was still visible in Warrens photos, then the object itself is not likely to have been a missile. Solid fuel engines such as those used in an SLBM create an uninterrupted exhaust plume for two to three minutes, after which time the solid fuel is spent, and the missile is usually out of view.
On the other hand, when an airliner transitions from cold moist air to warmer drier air, the dew point changes and contrail formation decreases. In the case of USP902, the airliner would have been transitioning from moist cool air at altitude over the ocean to warmer, drier air over land. This could explain the contrail disappearing as the object moved farther east.
Mick West created a "chronological cut" of Leyvas video and posted it to YouTube. The transition from moist cool air over the ocean to warmer, drier air over land may have occurred at 1:17 to 1:20 of the chronological cut, which Warren referred to as the separation of the object and the contrail. When still images from Leyvas video are compared to the overlay of Warrens photos, there is a remarkable similarity and continuity between the two sets of images, providing a better time frame for Leyvas video within the context of Warrens time stamps:
When Leyvas was initially queried regarding these later photos, he replied,
the [Contrailscience composite] animation only shows the path the plume drifted and not anything in flight. The 30-45 seconds of video I captured in which I could see the object (the portion of the video showing the glow/flame of the object at its pinnacle) occurred 8-10 minutes prior to the animated images of the animation (if the time stamps are accurate). I have no way of telling if those time stamps are accurate since the raw video has no real-time time stamp associated with it. I can only go by an estimated time based on the time we launched out of John Wayne airport and the approximate time of our weather shot. My guess is that the time stamps are relatively close to the accurate time. However, what you are seeing in those images is the plume drifting and not anything in flight.
Leyvas still maintains the object creating the contrail is not visible in Warrens photos 8 to 10 minutes later:
The separate smaller trail that is separate from the main body of the plume and that was captured by Warren in his photos, which makes it seem as if the object continued in flight, appears in my video to possibly be the top portion of the plume that partly dissipates leaving a segment of the tip adrift - detached from the main body of the plume. (I highlight "possibly be" because during that portion of the video, I zoom in and out and pan off and back onto the plume, so I'm not sure if what we are seeing is a stage of separation like that of a missile or if it's the tip of the plume separating from the main portion). I did zoom into that portion to see if I could see a craft of some kind (at the time I thought that there was a chance the object was still making condensation/exhaust) but there was nothing there creating that segment. Had there been, I know I would have been able to see it with the high-powered lens I was using. Add to that - if it was traveling toward us, the closer it would come the easier it would be to see it, but there was nothing there. That's why I said it was merely the plume adrift and not anything continuously flying.
Though there was no time code associated with the raw footage I shot, you are still able to accurately time the footage from the moment I started the recording (as we departed John Wayne airport) to the final moments of the mystery missile story. When I play the video I can time the duration of the object in flight which was between 30-45 seconds of "Glow Time" - which is inclusive within, and at the end of the 2-3 minute estimated flight time from which the plume was visible at the horizon ... I can rely on the raw footage as it plays to gauge my estimated times since it plays back in real time on the player deck's control track timer.
There were also two unknown witnesses who captured images of the contrail, both anonymous posters on the image hosting website Flickr. A photographer on Hermosa Beach, north of Leyvas and Warren, uploaded a photo of the November 8 sunset and only subsequently realized he had captured the same contrail due to media reports. From his vantage point, without the setting sun directly back-lighting the contrail, it apparently appeared similar to the other contrails in his sunset photo.
Another anonymous photographer uploaded photos of clouds at sunset on November 8, and noticed a bright horizontal contrail that he subsequently associated with the media reports regarding the contrail. Notice that in the case of these latter two eyewitnesses, the first noted nothing unusual about the contrail until he read media reports about it, and the second viewed a horizontal, not vertical contrail.
Finally, the opinions of the known military experts must be taken into consideration. Several highly credible experts have stated their opinion that the contrail in question represented the launching of an SLBM.
A little further background from Leyvas might shed more light on the way the video was edited and presented to the public. Leyvas related that the video was taken during sweeps week in his TV market, and part of his job during sweeps week is to go out and look for and capture video of interest for sweeps week ratings. The video he captured of the contrail was subsequently heavily edited before being aired, and less than two minutes of the ten minutes of video has been seen by these experts. From the perspective of garnering sweeps week ratings, the footage was certainly successful.
It may be that the experts would modify their opinion based on viewing the entire footage. The footage is owned by the local CBS affiliate and nothing was found by the Department of Defense in reviewing the footage that would prevent its release to the public. According to Leyvas, it might still be available on their server. If that is the case, it should just be a matter of uploading the unedited ten minutes of video to YouTube to put an end to the debate.
MATTERS OF NATIONAL SECURITY
Mysterious missile launch baffles even eyewitnesses
Video, still photographers watched contrail soaring over Pacific Coast
I think you got the answer in the bits you posted from the old missileer.
Personally I don't have a theory...my first reaction to the video is it looked like a missile...no contrail I'd ever seen had that appearance. Some prominent people said the same (and I thought your lighting observation had merit). And the debate began. I thought the official Pentagon explanation to be fishy...not like our government doesn't lie to us at any time, and sometimes for good reason. Personally I'd rather be sure it was a contrail as I live in the LA basin and errant missile shots are not confidence inspiring, no matter what the source. Anyway then you fill in with deductive reasoning (since getting the cold hard facts is often impossible)...like why the camera guy thought this was newsworthy if just a contrail. After all the debate the jury is still out for me. I'm not into conspiracy theory stuff but I'm not a dumb American who always buys the "nothing to see here move along" government mantra either~
That describes my feelings about it perfectly. In addition to impressing Gil Leyvas it impressed Rick Warren enough that he took over fifty photos of it. That can’t be sloughed off as “jazzing up the news for Sweeps Week.”
But conspiracies are so much more titillating than old Occam...
It's right there in the photos and video. The contrail stopped, therefore the airliner must have passed from a region where persistent ice crystals were formed into a region where only volatile water droplets were formed. QED.
You have no data. You are substituting an assumption for facts.
False accusations seem to be more self-satisfying than personal accountability for you.
Sorry, I’m just reacting in kind. Or had you missed all the false accusations and ad hominem being flung about on this thread before my mild retort?
The contrail itself is visible, factual evidence of atmospheric conditions at that altitude.
"Go read the article" isn't an answer it's an evasion.
You are assuming it was an airplane. You are assuming what the meteorological conditions were. Two assumptions are not a very good basis for a logical scientific conclusion.
Go read the articles and compare them, then see post # 495.
It must be fairly obvious to most objective observers; it was so obvious to the moderators here, that they moved this thread from bloggers to Front Page News.
That is something they rarely if ever do. They would not violate their own standards in this regard unless it was that blatantly obvious.
If you can’t see or refuse to see that which everyone else is seeing, my going through it line by line for you won’t be of much assistance to you.
Everyone else isn’t seeing it and I doubt that you can read the minds of the mods.
I would be happy to do a line by line comparison, but I was forbidden from posting the entire WND article on FR by Jim Robinson. WND does not permit posting of entire articles on FR, they must be excerpted. Jim Robinson would not grant a waiver on this for this article even though I was named as the "author" on the WND article.
So all I can do is point you to the two articles and tell you to compare them yourself.
(Apparently there is a history here between FR and WND to which we are not privy.)
The tiny cadre of missile conspiracists aren't seeing it, maybe, but then they have no incentive to see it either. Not much I can do to help that.
When you can't answer a question smear the opposition. Very Saul Alinsky of you.
I’m not assuming it was an airplane - that fact has been clearly demonstrated in a number of different ways.
And I’m not assuming what the meteorological conditions were, since the conditions are visibly illustrated by the contrail that the airplane left.
On the other hand, there are indeed a handful of vocal FReepers still defending the discredited missile conspiracy theory. That is simply a truthful statement.
One man's Saul Alinsky style is another man's honest debate, as this thread so ably illustrates.
Be that as it may, this thread is well past its best-if-used-by date.
A Blessed Christmas to you.
So instead you do it to me who has not done it to you. Nice.
On the other hand, there are indeed a handful of vocal FReepers still defending the discredited missile conspiracy theory. That is simply a truthful statement.
No, there is an intentional smear and false accusation in it.
A Blessed Christmas to you.
Obviously a very meaningful event for you. /s
I think Finny was right you had an agenda before you ever interviewed him.
So instead you do it to me who has not done it to you. Nice.
If you say so ;-)
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