posted 07-28-2001 12:19 PM            

My guess is that the plane couldn't have been miles high because it was streaking across the sky like a rocket. I thought contrails could form at only 33,000 feet or above? This plane was not that high.

As I watched the trail linger and give off sub-trails, a noticed another plane, this one looked black, tracing the path of the silver-looking plane that gave off the trail. It was a mere speck in the sky, but I could tell that number one, it was a different color than the first, and, number two, it gave off NO CONTRAIL whatsoever even though I'm sure it was flying at the same altitude as the first because it displaced some of the trail whenever it passed through it. I watched the second plane continue its tracing path until it disappeared.

Maybe three minutes later, another plane comes into view, following the same path as the two before it. This one appears silver and it billows the all-too-familiar trail behind it. All three traveled at what looked to me as the same altitude. Two of the planes left trails, one did not. How can this be explained?

The trails, by the way, dissipated faster than they usually do, but I noticed what was once a clear sky above turned quickly into a murky sea of gray.

I live in the DC area, and just to let those who wonder know, there are so many trails over this area on any given day that it is impossible to count them all.

Some of these trails I have observed literally saturate the sky with these wispy sub-trails that turn into cirrus clouds of...pray-tell...what?