NASA, the American space agency has released a mysterious image that shows a fire cloud floating above earth and at the first glance, it literally resembled a scene depicted in Luc Besson's sci-fi film 'Valerian and the city of Thousand Planets'.
The image was initially shared on NASA Earth Observatory (NEO) website. In the website, the US space agency revealed that the image was captured in skies over eastern Washington state at an altitude of about 30,000 feet when a pilot flew into the fire cloud.
"On August 8, 2019, a team of atmospheric scientists got an exceedingly rare look at these clouds as they were forming. The flight was part of a joint NOAA and NASA field campaign called FIREX-AQ. Scientists are studying the composition and chemistry of smoke to better understand its impact on air quality and climate," wrote NASA on their website.
Fire clouds are scientifically known as pyrocumulonimbus or PyroCb cloud, and it occurs in the skies when heat and moisture, usually from wildfires rise up into the atmosphere, later forming smoke-filled thunderclouds atop the plume of the fire.
NASA sent the team of atmospheric scientists to understand more about the atmospheric effects created by these fire clouds. During the flight, NASA's flying laboratory collected samples from the cloud. In the meantime, David Peterson, a FIREX-AQ forecaster who was on the plane captured the amazing picture of a fire cloud glowing brightly in the skies.
After capturing the image, Peterson revealed that images of fire clouds are very rare and the visual of this natural phenomenon is absolutely stunning.
"The views were absolutely stunning. Very few photographs of large pyroCbs are available, especially from the air," said Peterson.
Peterson also captured another image that shows huge plumes of smoke rising from the earth's surface, with a cluster of white clouds piled on top of them.
