Long March Rocket Plume from Hong Kong

An illuminated exhaust plume of a Chinese Long March 6A rocket, launched from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in Shanxi on the evening of 15 October 2024.⁠Dimsumdaily

Long March Plume

The photo was taken at 19:15:50 on 15 October 2024 HKT. That evening a Long March 6A lifted off at about 19:06 HKT, carrying the second batch of 18 Qianfan (“Thousand Sails”) broadband satellites into polar orbit.⁠Chinadailyhk

From Hong Kong the rocket’s high-altitude exhaust expanded into a bright, cone- or fan-shaped glowing plume (the classic “space jellyfish” / rocket-plume effect). The bright core and the diffuse white-to-reddish light match exactly what is visible in your photo. Many people in Hong Kong who were out looking for Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS that night also saw it and initially thought it was a UFO; local astronomers (including the Ho Koon Nature Education Cum Astronomical Centre) later identified it as the Long March 6A plume.⁠Dimsumdaily

The thin streak higher in the frame is just a separate high-altitude cloud or contrail. This was a routine satellite-constellation launch whose exhaust became spectacularly visible under the clear evening skies.