What am I

Okay my two cents (well pence being British)... 1. The flashes mentioned in the original post are just lightning. 2. It is true that if this is LV-426 then there is a discrepency between the landscape as established in Alien and Aliens. What was it Ash said "Its almost primordial" (which I know was about the atmosphere, but the planet looked primordial too). Yet in Prometheus it looks more like Mars. So we have a dead planet becomes a infant planet. Could the crash of the Derelict result in the terraformation of LV-426? 3. I don't think Holloway infects Shaw, the scene in the trailer looks like he's suffocating due to lack of air (think Total Recall and Event Horizon). Maybe his helmet gets damaged? Okay, 3 cents/pence then.

Loving all of the updates! Keep it up!!

First off, to answer the original question: I think it's a storm on the planet. You can clearly see another 'flash of light' under the clouds just under the space ship on the scene where it's flying over the clouds with the larger planet on the left. I think it's either two different ships, or they are shown out of sequence. The scene with Shaw-Rapace looking up can't be the ship that's in the explosion if the explosion happens first because in the explosion, you can clearly see smoke and fire coming from out of a hole in the ship just short of the observation dome. So maybe Shaw-Rapace sees the ship from ground. It's takes off. It hits something. Then crashes - hence the reason why they are fleeing. About being pregnant etc. I don't think that first woman with her face all askew, raising her head up is Shaw-Rapace. I think it's someone else. She looks more Asian and also has a wider jaw-line than Shaw-Rapace. Just my thoughts.

Lightning - we already sussed If you mean the Prometheus; third possibility - they go to two planets, but I think they're just shown out of sequence. If you mean the Derelict, the flames and smoke could have extinguished by the time it settles in that position. Most people, myself included, believe the Pregnancy Victim to be Shaw-Rapace.

Okay, well that would be a very interesting twist - because there is certainly a hole where the smoke/fire are coming out from the derelict. HOWEVER - since we're assuming/thinking the Derelict is bio-mechanical, maybe it somehow has 'healed' itself and the hole is now fixed? I'm so excited about this film!!! :):):)

could be

I loved my idea, which was that... The Derelict is crashing and on LV-426 at that because The Company had been monitoring the events taking place on board the Prometheus, and discovered soomeone fromthe crew stole some ampules, they know something as well about the race of Engineers who are pissed now that some of their terraforming vials have been stolen by Earth Reps and decide to PUNISH ALL OF MANKIND by destroying EARTH...they load up the Derelict wiht Ampules programmed for XENOMORPH development and send it hurling towards Earth. The company is aware, intercepts it somehow {If you look properly you will notice The Derelict has been Fired at by something or some other ship is crashing into it, there's debris evidence everywhere of this by the way}, and in doing so it creash lands on LV-426 wht the cargo that was orginally intended for Earth. The Cargo itself is damaged now, and of course because of this, and Kane's intrusion, the rest is History!!!

LV-426 had a true atmososphere it was just mostly methane. Ash describes it as practically primordial

David might reprogram the navcomputer on SJ ship to go to LV-426 and the damage in the crash turns a facehugger loose. Another possibilit is that shaw gestates the first facehugger pod and it wriggles back to the SJ ship and infects the pilot.