Multicolored Clouds Created by NASA Rocket Will Soon Drift Overhead

A United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket lifts off carrying the Orbital ATK Cygnus pressurized cargo module from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, United States on April 18, 2017. (NASA/Handout via REUTERSTHIS)

NASA launched a rocket Thursday, June 29 from their Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia to create colored clouds. The red and blue-green clouds will be used to study a number of things, such as particle motion.

They will also test the rocket’s ejection system, and improve researchers’ understanding of the ionosphere and aurora.

The artificial clouds were visible from New York to North Carolina. Total flight time was planned for 8 minutes and the payload was to be dropped off into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Virginia where NASA says it will not be recovered.

Eleven previous launch attempts were aborted due to weather conditions.