Experts explained why the light pillars were mistaken for a combat laser

“Too good to be true”

On the night of October 5, amazing pillars of light were seen in Moscow, Belgorod and a number of other cities in the European part of the country. The phenomenon has given rise to a lot of speculation. Some thought that this was the combat use of the Peresvet laser on American satellites. This version has become very popular. Why?

The version of the miracle weapon did not last long. It was refuted by … meteorologists. According to the leading specialist of the Phobos weather center, Mikhail Leus, the light pillars appear due to the refraction of light in ice crystals in the air. Most often they can be observed at temperatures below zero. Just such a temperature was at an altitude of about a kilometer at night.

Well, the appearance of exotic versions around a rare atmospheric phenomenon, it turns out, is easy to explain psychologically. In recent weeks, unspiritual news has come from the front line of the special operation: they retreated there, retreated here. Want something else.

Military blogger Andrei Medvedev drew an analogy in this regard with the events of 100 years ago, which were described by Konstantin Paustovsky. Under Petliura in Kyiv, Paustovsky wrote, rumors “acquired the character of a spontaneous, almost cosmic phenomenon.” For example, in one of the orders “it was said that on the night of tomorrow the command of the Petliura army would fire deadly violet rays against the Bolsheviks, provided to Petliura by the French military authorities.”

“Dear friends,” the blogger wrote in the Telegram channel. – I understand – the time is difficult. But still, let’s keep our dignity, reason and let’s not turn into Paustovsky’s heroes … Well, no one wrote that the combat shamans took up positions.

In the Rybar Telegram channel, they also laughed at various versions: “Someone has already managed to joke that mines with strategic nuclear weapons have opened, and doomsday searchlights have hit the sky. And some channels report that they have finally launched the Peresvet laser systems, which work on the orbital constellation of the West. I would like to believe … Because then the belief returns that we have weapons from the category of “no analogues”, we began to use them.”

But, “it’s too good to be true,” the author notes.

Although on the other hand, why not remember the “Peresvet”? More than enough reasons. After all, this combat laser, as they say, is capable of blinding an enemy spy satellite, well, or at least temporarily disable it. Allegedly, it can reach orbits of 500 kilometers with a laser beam.

Today, “Peresvets” are on combat duty in the Teykovskaya missile division of the Strategic Missile Forces in the Ivanovo region, where, in theory, they do not allow US satellites to monitor the movement of Yars mobile missile systems with intercontinental missiles.

That is, theoretically, these complexes could prevent the satellites of NATO countries from observing the movement of Russian troops in the zone of a special military operation in Ukraine. And with this we have a problem. Compared to a small Russian constellation of surveillance satellites, NATO has a whole armada of satellites that allow online transmission of important information to the General Staff of Ukraine. Something must be done about this.

In addition, our military leaders assured that work was underway to increase the capacity of the Peresvet complex, and even in the coming years it was planned to place it on an aircraft.

So, who knows, we may also have to see “light pillars” of a different kind. It is difficult, almost impossible, to catch up with the United States in terms of the number of reconnaissance satellites. On the other hand, it is quite possible to reduce the American space fleet helping the Ukrainian troops.

They say that in the USA they are very much afraid of this. Especially after the explosion of gas pipelines pumping Russian gas.