"SpaceX just shared some footage from a successful attempt to recapture part of a rocket’s nose cone after it plunged into the ocean. The results are stunning.
The maneuver last month marked the first time after a launch that a piece of the rocket’s cone, which is also called a fairing, was recovered. The fairing guided itself into a giant net hoisted up by a crew boat. SpaceX has been trying to do this for more than a year."
“Friction heats up particles in the atmosphere, which appear bright blue in the video,” SpaceX said in a tweet that included the video.
Also visible in the footage is a parachute — shaped like a giant stick of gum — that the fairing deployed.
Scott Manley has an excellent description of it on Youtube. He explains that the purple color is most likely IR light that is normally invisible to the human eye and displayed as purple on the video.
Back during the Columbia accident investigation, I got to see similar video shot from a Shuttle during entry. It was out the window at the top of the cabin looking back at the tail. It looked similar with all the flow coming to a glowing point behind the vehicle except it had a strong pink glow instead of blue.
The video was taken by one of the crew who was up wondering around shooting footage during reentry. He was supposed to be strapped into his seat, but it wasn’t his first flight and he was bored. No one but the crew knew about the video until after the Columbia accident. Someone said, “if only we had video of the plasma field?” and one of the astronaut corp said “well …”