Night launch: a sounding rocket climbs through the clouds

In NASA footage, the bright flame of a sounding rocket lights up the horizon as it lifts off from a pad surrounded by trees in the dark. The rocket climbs vertically, leaving a white column of smoke behind it.

Within seconds the flame reaches the cloud deck and fills it with an orange glow, while smoke lingering around the pad slowly drifts away on the wind.

Sounding rockets carry short scientific experiments into the upper atmosphere without reaching orbit.