I thought it was a nice way to close 2014! This mysterious rainbow-like optical phenomenon is called a glory.
And these spectres of the brocken have been captured on video at Mount Kasprowy, Poland. Eerie!
Prees on the following image to watch the video:
Glories can be seen on Earth with the naked eye when looking down upon fog or water vapor, as when climbing a mountain or looking down upon clouds from an airplane.
The weird weather phenomenon is caused by light scattered backward toward the viewer by individual water droplets, producing an oscillating pattern of colors ranging from blue to green to red to purple and back to blue again.
From the ground or an airplane, glories appear as circular rings of color and around the spot directly opposite the sun, from the viewer’s perspective, a spot called the anti-solar point.
Although glories look similar to rainbows, the way light is scattered to produce them is slightly different. Rainbows are formed by refraction and reflection, whereas glories are formed by backward diffraction.
Have you ever seen such a mysterious glory?
[…] Watch a mysterious glory and brocken spectre forming live on video! […]