When is the next space jellyfish launch?
A rocket that lifts off in twilight, while the ground is dark but its exhaust climbs into sunlight a few minutes into flight, can glow like a giant jellyfish. Every upcoming launch below is graded for that chance by our geometry model. A grade is a model estimate, not a promise, and launch dates move.
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Upcoming launches graded for a jellyfish
| Launch | When (pad local) | Site | Jellyfish chance | Side |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Falcon 9 USSF-481 | Thu, Oct 15, 4:44 PM PT | Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA | None | — |
| Falcon 9 Bandwagon 5 | Mon, Oct 19, 6:30 AM ET | Cape Canaveral SFS, FL, USA | High · T+4–5 min | Dawn |
| H3-24 Martian Moons eXploration | Mon, Oct 19, 7:41 PM UTC | Tanegashima Space Center, Japan | None | Dawn |
| Falcon 9 Starlink Group 15-15 | Tue, Oct 20, 3:14 PM PT | Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA | None | — |
| Falcon 9 Starlink Group 15-16 | Fri, Oct 23, 10:29 PM PT | Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA | None | Dusk |
| Soyuz 2.1b Progress MS-36 | Tue, Nov 24, 5:03 AM UTC (TBC) | Baikonur Cosmodrome, Republic of Kazakhstan | None | — |
6 dated launches in the next 45 days. “High” and “Medium” are the twilight launches worth planning around; “None” means daylight or deep night, where the plume either can’t stand out or never reaches sunlight. Times are in the launch site’s local zone; “(TBC)” means the date is not yet confirmed. Launches without a liftoff time yet are not graded.
Recent jellyfish launches
- Falcon 9 Dragon CRS-2 SpX-35 Recap →
- Falcon 9 Starlink Group 10-49 Recap →
- H3-22 Michibiki 7 Recap →
- Falcon 9 Starlink Group 10-45 Recap →
- Falcon 9 Starlink Group 10-42 Recap →
Flown launches our model graded high or medium for a plume, newest first. Each recap explains the geometry for that launch and which cities could see it. Saw something last night that isn’t here? Everything that crossed the sky in the last 48 hours →
What a space jellyfish is
The “space jellyfish” is a rocket’s exhaust plume lit by the Sun against a dark sky. In the near-vacuum above 60 km the exhaust spreads into a huge, faint cloud; when that cloud is in direct sunlight and the sky behind it is dark, it glows white, blue and pink in a shape people describe as a bell with trailing tentacles. The rocket itself is the bright dot at the tip. What a space jellyfish is, and how we predict it →
The geometry is the whole trick. At dawn, the Sun is still below the horizon for people on the ground, but a rocket 100 km up is already in sunlight, because from that height the horizon dips far enough for sunlight to reach it. At dusk the same thing happens in reverse. Launch too early and the sky is too bright for the plume to stand out; launch too late and the plume never leaves Earth’s shadow. The usable window is roughly 20 to 80 minutes either side of sunrise or sunset at the pad, which is why only a minority of launches qualify and why the grade shifts if a launch slips by an hour.
Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg dominate the list for two reasons: they fly far more often than any other site, and both sit on a coast with a wide, dark horizon. A Cape dawn launch heads east over the Atlantic toward the sunrise, so the plume climbs into light while Florida and the Southeast are still dark. Vandenberg’s dusk launches head south along the California coast and are seen across Southern California and Arizona. The October 13, 2026 CRS-35 launch from the Cape is the most recent widely photographed example. If you saw something strange overnight, last night’s launches and passes lists everything that actually crossed the sky.
More launch schedules
Today · Tonight · This week · Last night: what did I just see? · Full schedule
Space jellyfish launch FAQ
Is there a jellyfish launch today or tomorrow?
Check the table above: it lists every dated launch in the next 45 days with its jellyfish grade, soonest first, and rebuilds daily. Right now the soonest launch graded high is Falcon 9 Bandwagon 5, Mon, Oct 19, 6:30 AM ET. A grade is a model estimate from the launch geometry, not a promise, and launch dates move.
What time do jellyfish launches happen?
In twilight: roughly 20 to 80 minutes before sunrise or after sunset at the launch site. The ground has to be dark while the rocket, a few minutes into flight and 60 to 150 km up, climbs back into sunlight. Daylight launches are too bright for the plume to stand out, and deep-night launches never leave Earth’s shadow. The plume usually glows around T+3 to T+5 minutes after liftoff.
Can I see a jellyfish launch from my city?
The lit plume sits high enough to be seen several hundred miles from the pad on a clear twilight morning or evening, so much of Florida and the Southeast can see Cape Canaveral launches and much of Southern California can see Vandenberg ones. Enter your ZIP or city in the launch finder to see whether a given launch clears your horizon and which direction to face.
How accurate is the jellyfish grade?
The grade comes from geometry we can compute: the Sun’s elevation at the pad at liftoff and whether the exhaust plume is above Earth’s shadow during its expansion phase, using a representative ascent profile for the rocket’s trajectory. It does not know the weather, the rocket’s throttle profile or your local horizon, so treat high as “the setup is right”, not “you will see one”. A launch that slips by even an hour can change its grade.