Noctilucent Clouds over Florida

These clouds are doubly unusual. First, they are rare noctilucent clouds , meaning that they are visible at night -- but only just before sunrise or just after sunset. Second, the source of these noctilucent clouds is actually known. In this rare case, the source of the sunlight-reflecting ice-crystals in the upper atmosphere can be traced back to the launch of a nearby SpaceX rocke t about 30 minutes earlier. Known more formally as polar mesospheric clouds , the vertex of these icy wisps happens to converge just in front of a rising crescent Moon. The featured image -- and accompanying video -- were captured over Orlando , Florida , USA about a week ago. The bright spot to the right of the Moon is the planet Jupiter , while the dotted lights above the horizon on the right are from an airplane .