A critical analysis of Bill Rostron's presentation on the Cloud
The Cloud: Just the Facts • Intro • Prophesied? • Location? • Cause? • Rostron Debunked • Timing?
Five Hours in Defense of a Make-Believe Story
"When it's all said and done you'll either have to say one or two things — I don't know what that is, it's a mystery — and brother Bill will say enough so that the world will have to admit we don't have an answer. But the Bride has an answer." — Pastor Luke Gibson, introducing Bill Rostron's series
Bill Rostron is exactly the kind of person Message believers need making arguments on their behalf. He spent 46 years in the nuclear power industry doing quality assurance and root cause analysis. He knows how to build a chain of evidence. He takes his work seriously. And in his nearly six-hour series In Defense of the Supernatural Cloud (March 2020), recorded at the Tabernacle of the Lord in Townville, South Carolina, he applies genuine technical skill to the question of whether a Thor rocket launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base could have produced the famous cloud over Flagstaff on February 28, 1963.
The result is a presentation that is methodologically serious in parts, fatally flawed in others, and — most importantly — never once asks the question that actually matters.
What Rostron Claims, and What He Admits He Can't Prove
Start with what Rostron himself says at the close of his series:
"All of the things we've said today doesn't prove that God did it, but it sure does prove that man didn't do it."
That's an honest statement. Credit where it's due. Rostron is not claiming to have scientifically proven a supernatural event. He's claiming to have eliminated the rocket as a natural cause.
But by the end of the evening, Pastor Gibson is telling the congregation that they don't need an answer — they already have one. The crowd is singing. The cloud has become proof of Revelation 10:1–7 and divine confirmation of William Branham's ministry. The gap between "man didn't do it" and "God did it" has been closed by emotional momentum, not logic.
This is the first and most important error of the entire presentation. Ruling out one natural explanation does not establish supernatural causation. That logical gap is not a technicality — it is the entire structure of the argument. Rostron builds a case against the rocket, and the congregation quietly converts his inconclusive findings into proof of the miraculous. No one in the room challenges this move. It should be challenged.
The Self-Defeating Moisture Argument
Rostron spends significant time establishing a genuine point of atmospheric physics: natural moisture gets "wrung out" of the air as altitude increases, and by the time you reach the stratosphere and mesosphere, the water vapor content is so low — he puts it at about five parts per million — that cloud formation is essentially impossible under normal conditions.
He's right about this. Natural clouds do not generally form at 43 kilometers. This is not disputed. Noctilucent clouds can form at at approximately 76 to 85 kilometers altitude. This is worth noting because Rostron borrows noctilucent cloud physics (twilight-only visibility due to extreme tenuousness) to explain the Flagstaff cloud's behavior, but he's applying the analogy to a cloud at a completely different altitude. The Flagstaff cloud sits in a region where neither ordinary clouds nor noctilucent clouds naturally form, which is exactly what makes the rocket explanation compelling. The Thor's explosion introduced water into an environment that had no business having a cloud at all, and the resulting ice crystal dispersal at 44 km would behave optically much like a noctilucent cloud: extremely tenuous, catching oblique sunlight, invisible against a bright sky, appearing only at twilight.
In other words, the noctilucent analogy actually helps the rocket hypothesis far more than it helps Rostron's argument. It explains the cloud's appearance and its daytime invisibility, while simultaneously demolishing his mass calculation, because a cloud that behaves like a noctilucent cloud requires noctilucent-level water content, not cirrus-level water content.
But Rostron then uses this fact to argue against the rocket hypothesis. Here's the problem: the rocket hypothesis does not require natural moisture. The entire premise of the rocket explanation is that the Thor, when destroyed at 44 kilometers, introduced water and combustion products into an environment that would not otherwise contain them. That's precisely why the cloud appeared where natural clouds don't.
Rostron's atmospheric moisture argument doesn't undermine the rocket hypothesis. It actually explains why the rocket hypothesis is necessary — because something had to put water up there. His own analysis establishes that the cloud required an external source of water, then pivots to arguing the rocket couldn't have been that source. But he never closes the loop on what that source was. He's eliminated natural formation and claimed to eliminate the rocket. What he hasn't done is identify a third candidate. "God did it" is not a third candidate in a root cause analysis — it's an admission that the analysis is over.
The Mass Calculation: Critical Omissions
This is where Rostron's engineering rigour breaks down most clearly, in two separate ways.
Error One: The Wrong Rocket Component
Rostron's key quantitative argument runs as follows: he estimates the cloud required approximately 2.2 million pounds — which he later corrects to approximately 3 million pounds [4:18:44] — of water to form. He then turns his attention to the Castor-1 solid rocket boosters attached to the Thor. Based on his own dimensional measurements, he calculates roughly 12,000 pounds of solid propellant per booster [~2:59:38–3:01:50]. Three boosters, therefore about 36,000 pounds total. That's vastly less than 2.2 million pounds of water. Ergo, the rocket couldn't have done it.
The problem is that Rostron has analysed the wrong part of the rocket — and then stopped.
The Thrust Augmented Thor-Agena that was destroyed on February 28, 1963 was primarily a liquid-fueled vehicle. Its main engine burned RP-1 kerosene with liquid oxygen. The Castor-1 solid boosters were strap-on assist motors that augmented thrust during the initial phase of flight. Rostron lists the main engine propellants at [4:29:33]: liquid oxygen and RP-1 kerosene. He never calculates their water output.
We will return to what that calculation actually yields. But first, there is a separate problem with his booster analysis.
Error Two: The Booster Mass Overstatement
Rostron's figure of 12,000 pounds per Castor-1 booster came from his own back-of-the-envelope calculation based on physical dimensions. The published specifications tell a different story. The Castor-1 (TX-33-52) had a gross mass of approximately 3,852 kilograms (8,492 pounds) per unit, with a propellant mass of 3,317 kilograms (7,313 pounds) per unit. Rostron overstated the per-booster propellant load by roughly 64% compared to the published propellant mass figure.
He acknowledges this correction himself at [4:18:44], revising his total figure upward to approximately 3 million pounds — but the revision addresses the cloud's water requirement, not his error in the booster propellant estimate. Even with his overstated 12,000-pound-per-booster figure, the solid propellant total of ~36,000 pounds falls more than fifty times short of his 2.2-million-pound benchmark. The overstatement doesn't change the conclusion of his argument, but it demonstrates that a calculation he presents as rigorously engineered was built on unmeasured inputs.
The Actual Launch Timeline: What Was Burning at 44 Kilometers
To understand why the main engine matters so much, it's necessary to trace what actually happened on February 28, 1963, based on primary sources.
The rocket in question was a Thrust Augmented Thor (TAT)-Agena D configuration. The TAT stage consisted of a Thor liquid-fueled core with three Castor-1 solid rocket motors clamped to its exterior at 120° intervals.
The flight sequence, based on NASA technical documentation and contemporary reporting:
The vehicle configuration was a two-stage stack. The TAT (Thor with three solid strap-on motors) formed the first stage. Atop it sat the Agena D second stage, enclosed in a fibreglass clamshell shroud protecting the payload. The Agena's engine used two hypergolic propellants — unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (UDMH) as fuel and inhibited red fuming nitric acid (IRFNA) as oxidizer. Hypergolic propellants ignite spontaneously on contact with each other; no ignition system is required. The Agena carried approximately 14,900 kilograms (32,850 pounds) of propellant. It was designed to ignite only after Thor burnout and stage separation — an event that never occurred in this mission.
T+0 seconds — Liftoff. All engines ignite simultaneously: the Thor main engine (756 kilonewtons of thrust, burning liquid oxygen and RP-1 kerosene) and all three Castor-1 solid motors (each producing approximately 238 kilonewtons of thrust, for a combined solid boost of about 713 kN). The Agena second stage sits inert above, fully fuelled.
T+28 seconds — Solid motor full-thrust phase ends. According to the NASA post-flight report for the OGO-IV TAT-Agena mission (NASA TM X-1932), the solid motors "operate at full thrust for approximately 28 seconds and then decay to zero thrust in approximately the next 14 seconds." The motors are thrust-decaying from this point, but they are not yet exhausted.
T+42 seconds — Solid motor burnout. The solid propellant is fully consumed. The Castor-1 cases — now empty metal shells — remain physically clamped to the Thor's engine section. Per the same NASA document, "jettison of the expended solid motor cases occurs at about T+65 seconds." The rocket continues upward on main engine thrust alone, carrying the dead weight of three empty booster casings.
T+52 to T+60 seconds — Flight control malfunction. According to Missiles and Rockets magazine (March 11, 1963), the vehicle experienced a guidance or control failure and veered off its intended course before the T+65 second jettison sequence could execute.
T+52 to T+60 seconds — Range Safety Officer destroys the vehicle, at approximately 44 kilometers altitude, before the scheduled booster jettison could occur. The destruct charges blew open the main liquid propellant tanks. The resulting explosion vaporized the vehicle, including the still-attached (but empty) Castor-1 casings — and the fully-loaded Agena second stage sitting above them. Because the Agena's UDMH and nitric acid are hypergolic, they ignited spontaneously the moment the destruct charges ruptured their tanks and the propellants made contact. The Agena's entire propellant load — never burned during the mission — combusted in the explosion at 44 kilometers.
There are therefore three distinct points to note: first, the solid booster propellant had been completely exhausted for somewhere between 10 and 18 seconds before the explosion. Second, what Rostron analysed — 36,000 pounds of solid propellant — was not present at 44 kilometers. Those motors had fired themselves out. The empty casings reached 44 kilometers as inert structural debris.
Third, the propellants chemically active at 44 kilometers when the vehicle was destroyed came from two sources: the Thor main engine, still burning, and the Agena second stage, fully loaded and hypergolic.
The Two Calculations Rostron Never Performed
Source One: The Thor Main Engine
The Thor main engine was designed for a burn duration of approximately 165 seconds of powered flight. It burned liquid oxygen and RP-1 kerosene at a combined mass flow rate of roughly 273 kilograms per second, at an oxidizer-to-fuel ratio of approximately 2.25:1.
Total propellant loaded:
- RP-1 kerosene: approximately 13,874 kilograms (30,590 pounds)
- Liquid oxygen: approximately 31,217 kilograms (68,830 pounds)
- Total: approximately 45,091 kilograms (99,420 pounds)
At the time of destruction — estimated at T+52 to T+60 seconds, approximately 31–36% of the way through the engine's designed burn time — the following propellant remained in the tanks:
| Destruction time | RP-1 remaining | LOX remaining | Total remaining |
|---|---|---|---|
| T+52s | ~9,506 kg (20,960 lbs) | ~21,389 kg (47,160 lbs) | ~30,895 kg (68,100 lbs) |
| T+60s | ~8,834 kg (19,480 lbs) | ~19,877 kg (43,830 lbs) | ~28,711 kg (63,300 lbs) |
Best estimate: approximately 29,000–31,000 kilograms (64,000–68,000 pounds) of unspent Thor propellant at the moment of destruction.
RP-1 is a refined kerosene with the approximate molecular formula C₁₂H₂₄. When burned with liquid oxygen, the combustion reaction is:
C₁₂H₂₄ + 18O₂ → 12CO₂ + 12H₂O
This yields a water production ratio of approximately 1.286 kilograms of water per kilogram of RP-1 burned.
When the destruct charges ruptured the propellant tanks, the LOX and RP-1 mixed and combusted. Because the remaining propellants were in almost exactly the correct mixture ratio for complete combustion (a natural consequence of the engine having burned them at a fixed 2.25:1 ratio throughout the flight), combustion of the available RP-1 was largely complete.
Estimated water from Thor main engine:
| Destruction time | RP-1 available | Water produced |
|---|---|---|
| T+52s | ~9,506 kg | ~12,225 kg (26,960 lbs) |
| T+60s | ~8,834 kg | ~11,360 kg (25,050 lbs) |
Source Two: The Agena D Second Stage
Rostron lists the main engine liquid propellants at [4:29:33] and moves past them. He never mentions the second stage at all.
The Agena D was fully loaded with approximately 14,900 kilograms (32,850 pounds) of propellant when the vehicle was destroyed. It had never been ignited — the Agena was not designed to fire until after Thor burnout and stage separation, which never occurred. Every kilogram of its propellant was still aboard at 44 kilometers.
The Agena burned UDMH (unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine, formula (CH₃)₂N₂H₂) with inhibited red fuming nitric acid as oxidizer. These are hypergolic propellants — they ignite spontaneously on contact, requiring no ignition system. When the destruct charges ruptured the Agena's tanks, the UDMH and nitric acid mixed and combusted immediately.
UDMH combustion produces carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and water. With UDMH comprising approximately 25–28% of the total propellant load by mass (roughly 3,700–4,200 kilograms), and a water yield of approximately 1.2 kilograms of water per kilogram of UDMH burned, the Agena's contribution is:
~3,700–4,200 kg UDMH × 1.2 kg H₂O/kg = ~4,400–5,000 kilograms of water (~9,700–11,000 lbs)
Combined Water Production
| Source | Water produced |
|---|---|
| Thor main engine (RP-1, unspent at T+52–60s) | ~11,400–12,200 kg |
| Agena D second stage (UDMH, fully loaded, hypergolic) | ~4,400–5,000 kg |
| Total | ~15,800–17,200 kg (~34,800–37,900 lbs) |
This is the combined source term Rostron never calculated. Against his own cloud volume of 27 billion cubic meters, this water output is decisive — as the density comparison below makes clear.
The Cloud Density Contradiction: Rostron's Framework Collapses His Own Math
The water calculation above becomes even more decisive when examined alongside what Rostron himself says about why the cloud was invisible during the day.
Throughout the presentation, Rostron correctly invokes the physics of noctilucent clouds to explain one of the cloud's most striking features: nobody saw it until sunset. He explains the physics accurately [~2:54:35, 4:59:14]. Noctilucent clouds are visible only at twilight because they are too tenuous to scatter enough light to be seen against a bright daytime sky. They only become visible once the background sky darkens and sunlight catches them from far below the horizon. He uses this same principle to explain why the Flagstaff cloud was invisible during the day and only appeared as the sun went down.
This is correct. But Rostron never follows that logic into his density calculation.
Noctilucent clouds are extraordinarily tenuous. Their ice water content is typically on the order of 10⁻⁵ to 10⁻⁶ grams per cubic meter — roughly one thousand to one hundred thousand times less dense than an ordinary cirrus cloud. That tenuousness is precisely why they are invisible in daylight. A cirrus cloud, with its density of around 0.03 to 0.05 g/m³, is clearly visible in full sunlight. Something only visible during a narrow twilight window must be far, far thinner.
Rostron's mass calculation uses a cirrus cloud density of 0.05 grams per cubic meter (1/20 gram per cubic meter) [~2:49:05]. That is how he arrives at his 2.2 million pound figure. But he has already established in the same presentation that the cloud behaved like a noctilucent cloud in terms of its visibility. You cannot simultaneously argue that a cloud is too tenuous to be seen in daylight and assume cirrus-level ice density when calculating how much water formed it. Those two claims contradict each other directly.
The numbers expose the contradiction precisely:
At cirrus density (0.05 g/m³) — Rostron's assumption:
27 billion m³ × 0.05 g/m³ = 1,350,000,000 grams = 1,350,000 kilograms (~2.98 million pounds)
This is the figure Rostron uses to argue the rocket was inadequate. At a conservative intermediate density (10⁻⁴ g/m³) — 500 times less dense than cirrus:
27 billion m³ × 0.0001 g/m³ = 2,700,000 grams = 2,700 kilograms (~5,950 pounds)
At actual noctilucent cloud density (10⁻⁵ g/m³) — consistent with twilight-only visibility:
27 billion m³ × 0.00001 g/m³ = 270,000 grams = 270 kilograms (~595 pounds)
The combined water output of the Thor main engine and the Agena second stage — approximately 15,800 to 17,200 kilograms — exceeds:
- The noctilucent requirement (270 kg) by a factor of roughly 60
- The conservative intermediate requirement (2,700 kg) by a factor of roughly 6
The three solid booster casings contribute nothing, since their propellant was exhausted before the explosion.
The only way Rostron's mass calculation works is if you use cirrus cloud density. And using cirrus cloud density is logically incompatible with his own explanation for why the cloud wasn't visible during the day. A root cause analysis cannot select the physical properties of the cloud based on which properties support the desired conclusion. Either the cloud was dense enough to behave like a cirrus cloud — visible in daylight, requiring 2.98 million pounds of water — or it was tenuous enough to behave like a noctilucent cloud — invisible in daylight, requiring hundreds of pounds of water. It cannot be both.
The Anachronistic Wind Data
One of the more striking methodological problems in the series is Rostron's use of earth.nullschool.net — a real-time global wind visualization website — to argue about what the winds were doing at high altitude on February 28, 1963.
He pulls up current wind patterns above Arizona, shows that the winds at 10 millibar altitude (roughly 30 km) are around 65 km/h in his analysis session's present, and argues these speeds are insufficient to carry rocket material from Vandenberg to Flagstaff in 3.5 hours. He acknowledges he's watched the website "over the years" and noted seasonal patterns, but uses a single present-day reading as if it characterises the wind field on a specific day more than sixty years earlier.
Wind patterns at stratospheric and mesospheric altitudes are highly variable. They change with season, with quasi-biennial oscillation cycles, with individual synoptic events. Knowing what the winds are doing today tells you nothing reliable about what they were doing on a specific day in February 1963.
Dr. McDonald, who actually collected observational data at the time, described the measured wind speeds as "tantalizingly close" to what would be required. Rostron cites this but dismisses it on the grounds that McDonald "couldn't figure out how it would work" — which is not the same as saying it couldn't work. McDonald was being scientifically conservative. Rostron is substituting present-day data for past atmospheric conditions. These are not equivalent moves.
A Confusion About Wind Direction
Rostron also argues that the wind direction was wrong for the rocket hypothesis. He says the cloud was observed to be "moving towards the southeast," and from this calculates a required wind origin of about 310 degrees (northwest). He then claims that a northwest wind at Vandenberg would carry debris toward Baja California, not Flagstaff.
But Vandenberg Air Force Base is located to the west-northwest of Flagstaff. Flagstaff is roughly to the east-northeast of Vandenberg. A wind blowing from the northwest — pushing things toward the southeast — would carry material from Vandenberg's vicinity toward the direction of Arizona. Rostron's claim that such a wind would instead send debris toward Baja California appears to reflect a geographical confusion about the relative positions of these two locations. His own wind direction evidence may be consistent with the rocket hypothesis rather than contradictory to it.
The Question Rostron Never Asks
Here is what is missing from five hours and fifty-four minutes of technically detailed presentation: any engagement with William Branham's own testimony about the cloud.
Rostron establishes — or attempts to establish — that the cloud was not produced by a Thor rocket. He never mentions that:
Branham claimed to be standing directly underneath the cloud when it appeared. He wasn't. The cloud appeared over Flagstaff. By Branham's own account of his activities on that trip, he was approximately 200 miles away near Sunset Mountain and Rattlesnake Mesa.
Branham stated that the cloud formed when the angels left him. The cloud appeared on February 28. Branham's own sermons describe the angelic visitation as occurring on March 8 — eight days later. A cloud cannot be the departure of angels from a meeting that had not yet taken place.
Branham said nothing about any connection between the cloud and his ministry until he was shown the photograph in Life Magazine — months after the cloud appeared. If he had witnessed angels ascending into the sky and forming that cloud, that silence is inexplicable.
A second cloud is visible in the scientific photographs. Documented in Science magazine (April 1963), a companion cloud appears to the northwest of the main cloud, consistent with debris dispersal from a single source. No version of the angelic account addresses a second cloud.
These are not peripheral criticisms. They are facts drawn from Branham's own recordings and from the documented scientific record at the time. Whether the cloud was caused by a rocket, a natural phenomenon, or something else entirely, Branham's own account of his involvement with it cannot be reconciled with the known facts. Rostron's entire analysis — even if every calculation were correct — only defends the possibility that the cloud was unusual. It does nothing to explain why Branham's story changed over time, why he placed himself at the cloud's formation when he was demonstrably 200 miles away, or why he first learned of the cloud from a magazine.
What the Presentation Actually Establishes
To be precise about what Rostron's analysis shows and doesn't show:
He correctly demonstrates that natural clouds do not form at 43 kilometers through ordinary atmospheric processes. This is real atmospheric science and he explains it clearly.
He correctly notes that the cloud was unusual and that McDonald found it difficult to explain within the data available to him in 1963.
He raises legitimate questions about whether the Castor-1 solid boosters alone could account for the cloud — but only by ignoring the vehicle's primary propulsion system, which happened to be actively burning when the rocket was destroyed, and by applying a cloud density drawn from a completely different class of cloud than the one he invokes to explain the cloud's visibility behavior.
What his analysis does not establish is that the rocket could not have caused the cloud. His wind speed argument uses data from the present day. His mass calculation omits the main engine and applies an internally contradictory density figure. His booster propellant estimate overstates the published specifications by 64%. His moisture argument supports rather than undermines the rocket hypothesis. And his conclusion — that supernatural causation is therefore implied — does not follow from his premises even if those premises were correct.
The actual calculation, done with the correct rocket components and an internally consistent cloud density:
| Cloud density | Water required (27 billion m³ cloud) | Total rocket water available | Comparison |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cirrus — 0.05 g/m³ (Rostron's assumption) | ~1,350,000 kg | ~16,500 kg | Rocket: ~1.2% of requirement |
| 10⁻⁴ g/m³ (conservative; 500× less than cirrus) | ~2,700 kg | ~16,500 kg | Rocket: ~6× more than needed |
| Noctilucent — 10⁻⁵ g/m³ (consistent with twilight-only visibility) | ~270 kg | ~16,500 kg | Rocket: ~60× more than needed |
The only density at which the rocket "doesn't work" is cirrus density. And cirrus density is precisely the density that is incompatible with Rostron's own explanation for why no one saw the cloud during the day.
A Word for Those Who Watched the Video
If you've sat through this series, or heard someone cite it, or had it shared with you as the definitive answer to critics of the Message, you deserve to know what it actually proved and what it didn't.
Rostron is a capable engineer who spent months on this project. He clearly cares deeply about his faith, and he is trying to be rigorous. That's admirable. But rigour has to go all the way through — including to the question of whether the person whose testimony you're defending actually told a consistent, verifiable story.
The scientific question of what caused the cloud is genuinely interesting. But the problem with Branham's cloud story was never primarily scientific. It was always about why a man who claimed to stand under a cloud was 200 miles away when it appeared, why the cloud preceded his vision's fulfillment by eight days, and why he never mentioned any of this until a magazine brought the photograph to his attention.
Those questions don't get answered by atmospheric physics. They get answered — or not answered — by Branham's own words.
The honest thing to do is listen to those words again, carefully, and ask whether the story holds together. Not because critics want it to fail, but because the truth matters. A faith built on a story that doesn't hold up isn't safer for not being examined. It's just more fragile.
Sources and Technical References
- NASA TM X-1932 (December 1969), Lewis Research Center: Thrust Augmented Thor-Agena performance report, OGO-IV mission (July 28, 1967). Confirms solid motor burn time (~42 seconds: 28 seconds full thrust + 14 seconds thrust decay), planned jettison at T+65 seconds, and main engine propellant specifications. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19700003428/downloads/19700003428.pdf
- Missiles and Rockets magazine, March 11, 1963: Reports the TAT-Agena flight malfunction at T+52–60 seconds, before the T+65-second jettison sequence, resulting in range safety destruct with booster casings still attached.
- Wikipedia: List of Thor and Delta launches (1960–1969): Destruction altitude of 44 kilometers for the February 28, 1963 launch. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Thor_and_Delta_launches_(1960%E2%80%931969)
- Bill Rostron, In Defense of the Supernatural Cloud, Parts 1–3, March 2020. Tabernacle of the Lord, Townville, South Carolina. Timestamp references in this article refer to elapsed time in the combined recording.
Evidence from the Branham Family
Rebekah Branham Smith, William Branham's daughter, also wrote on the Cloud and specifically details the timing of the events surrounding the appearance of the Cloud in the Only Believe Magazine, "Road to Sunset".
- Only Believe Magazine, "Road to Sunset", Page 1
- Only Believe Magazine, "Road to Sunset", Page 2
- Only Believe Magazine, "Road to Sunset", Page 3
- Only Believe Magazine, "Road to Sunset", Page 4
You are currently on the page that is in bold.
Footnotes