Intense and beautiful circumhorizontal arc(fire rainbow) over florida

I've seen many pictures of this phenomenon, but these are really intense.



bigger pictures:


The pictures were photographed by Ken Rotberg, a jeweler from Delray Beach (South Florida).


I just found it on this german news source:
www.spiegel.de...

For more information on circumhorizontal arcs:
en.wikipedia.org...

Oh wait, I found it on DailyMail!
With the typical DailyMail coverage

... looks like a multi-coloured flying saucer ...

Then the saucers appeared.

www.dailymail.co.uk...

The pictures are a bit bigger, but they seem to be only enlarged versions of the above.

Wow, that is beautiful. I have never seen that before. Thank you!

reply to post by chiefsmom
My pleasure!
I really like this kind of luminous phenomenon.


I also recommend this very well done thread of OzWeatherman for further education on all the different athmospheric phenomenons.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

These luminescent clouds are starting to get more common. I guess the blue ones are said to be related to meteor dust or something. My question is why we are seeing more of them lately at lower latitudes than before. Something has changed.

reply to post by grobi77


Firstly, the images you posted are not images of a Circumhorizon arc.

Circumhorizon arcs (or CHAs) will always have the same sequence of colours (red on top and blue underneath), and will always be found below the sun in the sky, when it's at a high enough altitude (58° or above) above the horizon. Crucially, the colours will always be in distinct horizontal bands in a CHA, which they are not in the images you posted.

The phenomena in the images you posted is actually an Iridescent Pileus Cloud, which is not an ice halo/arc like a circumhorizon arc.

Secondly, as a photographer who specializes in photographing atmospheric phenomena, including iridescent clouds and ice halos, the images you posted look like they have been edited and the saturation (colour intensity) increased significantly, to the point where they no longer look "natural" to my eye.

THATS REALLY PRETTY. Never seen anything like that before. Thank You. Staring and Flagging your thread.!

Do you know the causes for this type of rainbow? just want to learn a little bit more about it.

Wow fantastic never seen something like that before.

Craving Lucky Charms cereal now.

reply to post by FireballStorm

Last year I saw a sunset with clouds about as bright and colorful and luminescent. I didn't take a picture but my wife and I stared at it for a while. I have never in my life seen these clouds before, I thought it may have been because of volcanic activity or something somewhere. I've seen those fluorescent blue clouds last year and this year. I had never seen those before either. I am a watcher of clouds and always seem to look up to see what's there. It is not just because I opened my eyes, my eyes have always been open. I understand these blue clouds existed farther up north and I believe that is probably true. It is important to note that there have been many more types of clouds identified here in the USA over the last five years than in the twenty years before. Are they all cloud formations that have existed before elsewhere or are some new cloud formations? One answer I have not been able to find.

Originally posted by rickymouse
These luminescent clouds are starting to get more common.

I beg to differ. Do you have any evidence to back up this assumption?

Also, they are not "luminescent", they are iridescent.

Originally posted by rickymouse
I guess the blue ones are said to be related to meteor dust or something. My question is why we are seeing more of them lately at lower latitudes than before. Something has changed.

If you are referring to noctilucent clouds - they are another phenomena altogether, but you are right about them being seen at lower latitudes than they were previously. Why this is happening is still a mystery, although it's suspected that it may have something to do with climate change.

reply to post by FireballStorm


My eyesight is just as good as others. Why do I need proof to state what I have observed. Just because you have personally not seen such bright clouds does not mean they do not exist. I had never seen these bright clouds like this before the last three years. Many people have seen similar ones up here during that time, I was not alone. Beautiful sunsets were common last year. They were west of here, in the evening. So my credentials are not as good as yours? I doubt that. Prove to me that really bright clouds like what I and many others have seen are non existent. I am sure others around here have taken pictures of them, just because I did not need to take a picture to enjoy them doesn't make them unreal. Maybe someone will see this discussion and post pictures of them.

PS. Just because I chose to use a general term and didn't know the specific term doesn't make my content less real.

Originally posted by FireballStorm
reply to post by grobi77

 

The phenomena in the images you posted is actually an Iridescent Pileus Cloud, which is not an ice halo/arc like a circumhorizon arc.

Secondly, as a photographer who specializes in photographing atmospheric phenomena, including iridescent clouds and ice halos, the images you posted look like they have been edited and the saturation (colour intensity) increased significantly, to the point where they no longer look "natural" to my eye.

I think, you are right...it looks definitely like an Iridescent Pileus Cloud.
Both DailyMail and Spiegel say it's a CHA. And I didn't questioned it

And you are also right with the increased saturation. I would say 30-40% less saturation looks right.
Thanks for clearing that up

Originally posted by BASSPLYR
Do you know the causes for this type of rainbow? just want to learn a little bit more about it.

Take a look at this link:

Originally posted by FireballStorm
The phenomena in the images you posted is actually an Iridescent Pileus Cloud, which is not an ice halo/arc like a circumhorizon arc.

reply to post by grobi77

If using a high megapixel camera with a high quality setting(high memory usage) the picture when reduced displays similar overpowering qualities. If you go to the link in the OP's first post the picture is more realistic looking. What happened does not appear to be an intentional act.

Originally posted by rickymouse
Are they all cloud formations that have existed before elsewhere or are some new cloud formations? One answer I have not been able to find.

They existed before, but some types of cloud (as you mentioned) have only recently been recognized as "new" types by science recently. Undulatus asperatus is the most recent separate cloud classification that I assume you are referring to.

As for your own experience spotting more "bright and colorful and luminescent" clouds for the first time, I think it mirrors the experience of many people including my own.

Luck probably has a lot to do with it - you spot a more spectacular/colourful display or sunset than you have experienced before, then after that you make more of an effort to keep an eye out for related phenomena.

It happened to me with meteors, then sun dogs - now I look up whenever I get a chance, and I see fireballs, many kinds of halos/arcs, and all kinds of atmospheric phenomena that people often assume are hard to see.

So I think it's a mixture of luck and/or being more observant.

reply to post by rickymouse


HARRP?

Haven't people caught colors like this in the sky before a huge EQ? Seems like I remember some making that connection...

Anyways...not saying this pic is of HARRP or weather mod....but, I've seen video before certain disasters w/ these type of colorful clouds, rainbow's...

reply to post by rickymouse


Do I have this right?? Reducing the dimensions of a picture, will increase the saturation?
Or do you talk about color depth (8/16/32bit)

reply to post by grobi77


Glad I could help.

Sources like the Daily Mail are notoriously unreliable as a source for accurate information. Not sure about Spiegel as it's the first time I've come across this source.

It's always worth checking and cross referencing a few sources to be sure

reply to post by FireballStorm


I once saw a harvest moon behind a church next to our home in Hancock. It encircled the whole church and covered the background. I ran into the house, got the camera, got the film, loaded the film, and ran outside only to find it shrunk to a tenth of it's size. Sucked. Even with my high priced camera (forty bucks on sale) in the sixties, I could not get this picture.

Since that time I have seen photos of this event and been jealous of their preparedness. I have seen it myself and know beyond a shadow of a doubt it is possible but the timing has to be perfect. I have never seen the moon appear this huge since. I always look. I have seen a huge fireball go overhead finding out it crashed in Canada above Duluth in the newspaper a few days later. It looked like it would have crashed within twenty miles but it was huge and was much higher than I knew.

Now adays with computer technology I look at the pictures of these similar events and wonder if they are real. With technology they can make these pictures look real. If I had not looked at the picture in the link at full size I would have assumed it was fixed purposely to look more impressive. The camera could have been set to a higher saturation but a fake looking picture is not desired by a good photographer. That is why I think it's altering was minimal..

reply to post by rickymouse


Sorry, I did not mean to come across as it seems I did in my reply to you.

Perhaps it was a bad choice of words, but I was only curious as to why you thought the way you did. I'm certainly not questioning your eyesight or "credentials"!

Likewise with the terminology - I just think using the correct terminology is important when talking about science based topics like this one, or else things get confusing. I would hope that if I used the wrong terminology, someone would correct me.