Standing on Bombay Beach (a wasteland in its own right) taking long exposures and timelapses, we saw a flaming….something that looked like it was coming toward us.

When it exploded and kept expanding, I realized it wasn’t a plane on fire but thought there was a good chance that a chemical or nuclear weapon had detonated over Los Angeles/Southern California. All I could do was stand there and realize life as I knew it could be over in a few minutes. So I did what anyone else would do. I took pictures of it.

The first few frames of the initial “white” explosion/blast/whatever are missing because for the life of me as I watched what I thought was maybe the end of the world, I forgot entirely how to use my camera.

I haven’t seen images like this on the news or in social media pics, what we saw was very different from what folks in L.A. saw.

Update: 2 GIFs below, 1 showing the full thing, and a GIF I created when I saw that I had captured the actual area of take off in the timelapse I was shooting. full gallery below that.

P.S. – Fun fact: the foreground in these pics is covered in dead fish because Bombay Beach is an ecological disaster. Bombay Beach in the daytime photos here: https://lessthanamateur.wordpress.com/2014/08/14/joshua-tree-and-the-salton-sea/ and here: https://lessthanamateur.wordpress.com/2014/09/09/salvaging-the-salton-sea/ An actual wasteland. Check it out.