How many of you know what a Sun or Moon Halo is? I certainly did not, but Annikki did.
In The New Collin's Concise Dictionary (1987) it is described as a circle of light around the sun or moon, caused by refraction of light by particles of ice.
I had been reading Samu's Fun Facts book in the car last week. I read that a rainbow is actually round, but we only see half of it above the horizon, and the curvature continues below it.
Today was a truly beautiful summer's day and Annikki was pottering around in the garden, watering the flowers. When she looked into the fish pond, she was surprised to see a rainbow. And she was seeing a full circle rainbow reflection!
She looked into the bright sky, but the blinding sunlight meant she saw nothing. She went to different spots in the garden till she finally saw this enormous rainbow ring, the HALO, around the sun.
She came in, told me, picked up the camera, to try to she if she could photograph it. I joined her and also tried my luck at getting this phenomena recorded.
Without a wide angle lens or proper filters, the above three are the best we could do. Annikki rang the local newspaper and informed them, so tomorrow we may see a better photo on line. I also informed Tony, who was out in the garden, but had not looked up into the sky. He too was excited at seeing this unusual phenomena!
I also have winessed a Sun halo with Fire Rainbow recently. 13/06/09 Chesil Beach , Dorset UK. around 12.00am. A perfect circle around the Sun with a very intense and vivid rainbow effect at the base. Absolutely beautiful. I got two shots on my mobile which are poor quality owing to me shooting directly into the Sun
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