The pink glow

2010-06-09T11:44:00.002+01:00

Empty offices filled with soft pink light?

Moscow 21 may 2010

2010-05-22T13:26:00.003+01:00

The sun was setting. Shining through Ian's ear illuminating the blood inside, it cast a pink glow on his neck.

Raspberry molecules

2009-06-20T10:38:00.003+01:00

'Astronomers searching for the building blocks of life in a giant dust cloud at the heart of the Milky Way have concluded that it tastes vaguely of raspberries.'

Guardian.co.uk Tuesday 21 April 2009 00.05 BST

An email

2009-04-19T13:49:00.003+01:00

An email from jcmegabyte, a creator of time lapse videos of clouds...

'As for clouds and odd colors, well it's all very scientific. Believers in UFOs, government conspiracies and such will happily invent their own reasons (HAARP, chemtrails, etc.), but basically, the colors are caused by particles and gases in the earth's atmosphere filtering and scattering certain colors of light, while allowing others. This has been going on since the earth had an atmosphere - long before mankind had any ability to affect it.

The more air the sun has to shine through (i.e. at low sun angles such as sunrise and sunset), the more of the high frequency light (blues, violets) are filtered out, leaving the lower frequency reds, oranges and pinks to light up whatever they hit, in this case, clouds. This effect is even more pronounced when there is a lot of pollution (from humans, volcanoes, etc.) in the air. When the sun is more overhead, there is less air to penetrate so more of the blues (and UV) get through, causing a more white light.

Interestingly, light and water works just the opposite - blue light penetrates deeper while the reds are filtered out, causing light underwater to be virtually void of any red color unless one (underwater photographers, etc.) brings an artificial light along. '

The sun sets over Asda, Seaham, Co.Durham UK

2009-03-11T14:53:00.005Z

Turning away from Asda to face the sea the sky was air force blue.

A false lead

2009-02-27T11:33:00.005Z

On reading (again in a free newspaper, on the 24th February 2008) that the following morning, artist Stuart Semple was going to release smiley-faced pink clouds over the capital from outside Tate Modern on London’s South Bank, I wondered (not necessarily in this order):

Could this be the cause of the pink glow?
- I had seen the pink glow for myself from this very location in November -
Was the pink glow a remnant of a trial run for the artist?
How could one control the appearance of a cloud?
Was this the end of my investigation in to the pink glow?

With some trepidation I arrived on the South Bank at 9am on Wednesday 25th February 2009 to witness the event. I was at first disappointed and then relieved to find I had followed a false lead made of helium, soap and vegetable dye.

Stuart Semple's Happy Cloud

I spent an hour watching the somewhat melancholy smileys drifting over the Thames, feeling a sense of community spirit as I held my mobile phone wistfully up to the sky in unison with my fellow cloudspotters.

I asked myself, had I really been expecting to see a spectacle akin to the aurora borealis emerge smiling from a cloud making machine?

Chinese candle light

2009-01-10T15:40:00.000Z

A day in early December. Sunlight enters my living room. It illuminates a red lacquered Chinese noodle flask, casting pink light on to the wall behind an extinguished candle.

November and December 08

2008-12-15T15:34:00.000Z

Life goes on. The pink glow hovers at the back of my mind, colouring my thoughts.

Another sighting 08.11.08

2008-11-10T15:20:00.001Z

I saw the pink glow again on the 8th November while waiting to watch a firework display on the Southbank, London. It was dispersing and re-forming in cloud-like fashion, varying in intensity of colour as it did so. By the time the fireworks started it had disappeared entirely.
I was unable to take a satisfactory photograph of the glow or the fireworks.

A sighting. 4.11.08

2008-11-05T15:00:00.000Z

Last night I saw the pink glow for myself over The Strand, London.

My mobile phone camera did not fully capture the phenomena.

What the people are saying

2008-10-30T14:45:00.005Z

Utter Rubbish | Do we ever get told the truth about anything any more? | Faulty camera perhaps? | Operation Bluebeam | Just talk about cloud, add a bit of reflection thing, then mix with a spoon of ice crystal, and voilà! | Seems to me that the governments really just don't want us to know | Look at the shape and concentration of this | our ancient ancestors | something bigger out there than paying the mortgage | Something's about to change in our world, the wheels are in motion | it is a 14-10-2008 lightship one week late | UFO's use magnetism to travel through space at speeds greater than those of light and electricity | Earth's magnetism is being prepared | Why only last week I saw purple, yellow and luminous green clouds | An everyday event | Amazing what audio-visual technology the military has at its disposal | Hadron Collider side effects | This is plea from Mother Nature to change our ways | That is no cloud | Hot flaming pink (and I am an artist, I know) WILL NOT be reflected that strongly as a color | He answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, It will be fair weather: for the sky is red | Chemical accident from a secret experiment | pink lights for breast cancer awareness | Credit Crunch | How lovely. What a beautiful picture. | The bible says in the End Days we must look to the sky to witness odd lights and the moon turning red | its not a UFO, but im not sure I buy this "lights of the city" thing | What this cana be? I think chemical cloud...or from fireshow. | I think these pictures were taken by a Canon camera, mine does this all the time | Aurora Borealis from the Pole, or what scientists call a sprite | martian am radio beam riding the visible light spectrum | the crytals in the sky creating a colour from the shine of the sun | how about a pink ghost? It's plausible you know | Doesn't look like city light reflections to me. Doesn't even look much like a cloud.

Reader comments on Evening Standard article - U.F.O.Glow: Mysterious pink light over London, Georgina Littlejohn, 21.10.08- internet accessed October O8

Comments on the article - Pictured: The mystery pink light that appeared over London, by Daily Mail Reporter - internet accessed October 2008

The Book of THoTH Paranormal Research and Discussion forum - internet accessed October 2008

Reader comments on Sun Online article - Mystery UFO glow spotted, by Vince Soodin - Published 22nd October 2008

The pink glow. 21.10.08

2008-10-25T14:20:00.001+01:00

A pink glow was photographed hovering over London by International Celebrity Photo Agency, Xposure Photos on the 21st October 2008 and promptly circulated through online and printed media, locally, nationally and internationally. I saw the image in a free newspaper on the train to work.

Much quoted in the press was a statement issued by a representative of The Met office.

"If you have very high cloud, as we did last night, you tend to get odd splodges of low cloud that will reflect the pink or sometimes orangey-pink lights of the city from all angles and stand out from the darkness of the sky. It can be truly spectacular to witness."
(From an article by Georgina Littlejohn, 21.10.08, Evening Standard )

This was the cause of much discussion, dispute and discrediting by readers of news websites and users of internet forums concerned with such ideas as the paranormal, conspiracies and digital art.