A giant black smoke ring floating in the sky over your city never feels great. If you’ve seen movies like Independence Day or Nope, the sight could be downright terrifying. But a recent example of the phenomenon may come with a fairly run-of-the-mill explanation.
WAVY TV 10 news in Virginia this week reported on a smoke ring hovering above the Hampton Roads area. The report features several user submitted photos of the floating object. It was a beautiful day when the smoke ring appeared so it really stands out against the clear blue sky.
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Members of the WAVY TV weather team Ricky Mathews and Steve Fundaro seemingly joked that the ring could be a sign of an alien invasion. But then they offered more plausible explanations including some form from pyrotechnics, an industrial process or an explosion.
And it’s likely that the ring did originate from a small explosion. Specifically, from an electrical transformer exploding and/or catching fire. Reddit user MrJoshiko called the phenomenon a soliton, - or a self-reinforcing wave, which means it propagates with little loss of energy and retains its shape. In this case, the smoke ring likely retained the cylindrical shape of a transformer that blew up, which can happen due to electrical or mechanical failures, lack of maintenance, or even lightning strikes.
The resulting smoke ring from a transformer failure seems to be a fairly regular occurrence. Similar rings have appeared earlier this year in Ohio, Texas and Germany and last year above Disneyland in California.
Transformers have been in the news lately. Cleveland-Cliffs last month shared plans to repurpose a closed tin plant for electrical transformer production. The company plans to invest $150 million into revitalizing the plant, which it hopes to open in 2026 and help address a “critical shortage of distribution transformers that is stifling economic growth across the United States.”
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