I too live in Colorado and yesterday was the first day is months that we had contrails. The white that you saw yesterday was fog, the result of a weather system that came in late Wed night. This time of year is when our weather really changes and we get systems rolling through every week, some bring rain/snow while others cool us off. Did you notice that the temp on Thurs was about 15 degrees cooler then Wed? Cool front came through.
I've been seeing the same as the Skyder photos for sixteen years now. They aren't any different from the pre-1995 contrail photos archived at the top of this messageboard.
The spreading of jet contrails into extensive cirrus sheets is a familiar sight. Often, when persistent contrails exist from 25,000 to 40,000 ft, several long contrails increase in number and gradually merge into an almost solid interlaced sheet.
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Contrail development and spreading begins in the morning hours with the start of heavy jet traffic and may extend from horizon to horizon as the air traffic peaks. Fig. 1 is a typical example of midmorning contrails that occurred on 17 December 1969 northwest of Boulder. By midafternoon, sky conditions had developed into those shown in Fig. 2 an almost solid contrail sheet reported to average 500 m in depth.
What are you testing for aluminum, and what exactly is the value?
If that's true I'll eat my hat.
