Maybe Gluon can fix this? "Excitement" is her middle name (what's her last name?)

Oops! US Space Force may have accidentally punched a hole in the upper atmosphere

The surprise rocket initially caught people's eye after creating an enormous exhaust plume that could be seen from more than 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) away. But after the plume dissipated, a faint red glow remained in the sky, which is a telltale sign that the rocket created a hole in the ionosphere — the part of Earth's atmosphere where gases are ionized, which stretches between 50 and 400 miles (80 and 645 km) above Earth's surface — Spaceweather.com reported. . . .Rockets create ionospheric holes when fuel from their second stages burns in the middle part of the ionosphere, between 125 and 185 miles (200 and 300 km) above Earth's surface, Live Science previously reported. At this height, the carbon dioxide and water vapor from the rocket's exhaust cause ionized oxygen atoms to recombine, or form back into normal oxygen molecules. This process excites the molecules and leads them to emit energy in the form of light. This is similar to how auroras form, except the dancing lights are caused by solar radiation heating up gases rather than their recombination.