Thought I'd drop these into the Earth Obs section, as they're ... err... earthy

Taken from the front of our house this Saturday - Spotted the one 'dog' - then realised it was almost a halo.

Doug

Here is a "glory" or parhelion that I saw at Koke'e on Kauai last January - it appeared to be about 30 meters away. Lasted a full 10 minutes.

GLORY - that reminds me.. A (dim) glory seen on a layer of fog from a place called Symonds Yat in Gloucestershire, UK... and another sun-dog seen from a flight out of East Midlands Airport flying to Malaga

I have a very poor shot of a parhelia taken through a car window that I'm struggling to find at the moment but in the meantime here's a picture of a pretty good rainbow shot I took in October in Chester. The picture doesn't quite capture it but this was one of the brightest rainbows I'd ever seen.
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A dog nicely picked out one cloud while I was watching the sunset from the ferry to Tasmania.

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close up

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And talking of rainbows, here is a panorama of a a full double rainbow taken from my flat in Sydney last year.

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James

I found the slightly dodgy parhelia shot taken from the car:
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While I was looking for it I came across this one that my girlfriend took that I only just realised has one in it too:
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That last one is amazing - I wonder if it's the local fog, or the distant cloud that's causing it.

I think it has to be distant cloud or more precisely the suspended ice particles in the distant cloud layer - the near field surface fog coming off the lake is certainly liquid droplets and I'm pretty sure that it's in the wrong place to cause the parhelia effect, it would need to be between the observer and the sun (I think). There's a ton of interesting stuff on this at http://www.atoptics.co.uk/halosim.htm.

..since we're showing off our rainbow pictures: a nice one at sunset

I have a sunset one too. This was particularly spectacular at the time.

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James

...no kidding! Wow.

Saw a great cirrus rainbow directly overhead @ 3 PM local about a month ago while on Reserve duty...one of the guys took a pic, will try to get it & post it...really an amazing sight!

I took this picture last year, does anybody know what it is?

Looks like a passing rocket left a hole in the cloud deck...

-the other Doug

Fantastic pictures, guys!
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I took this parelia (sun is behind the thick cloud) few months ago from l'Aquila/Italy.

I was there too but didn't seen it I guess it was near Waipo'o falls.
I propose this picture taken in Cavan (Ireland) where atmopsheric phenomena meets with water phenomena. Mind, this is NOT a B & W picture :Click to view attachment

Behold my glory! Here's one more shot of my Kauai parhelion taken in the late afternoon on 15 January 2007 on the Kalalau Lookout - Pihea trail at 22°09'N, 159°37'W. The view is NW down off a knife-edge ridge and of course the sun is low behind me. I also have a short movie with the glory "moving" (me running back and forth). Some wonderful alternate names for this phenomenon (courtesy of wikipedia) are "Buddha's light" and "the Brocken spectre".

I really don't know what it is, that's why I am asking

It was perfectly round and huge and arrived from east and disappeared west and cirrus like clouds were exactly at the same height with the clearing as their positions did not change with the perspective. I watched it for more than one hour. The light at the center is sun and a linear rainbow-like belt could be seen near it.

Apparently, these are called "hole-punch" clouds. I couldn't find out much about them, but here's a page that talks about them a little:
Hole-punch clouds over Melbourne

They sure look impressive and UFO-like and IIRC they've often been talked about in the context of super secret weapons tests and other weird theories.

EDIT: Ahhh, I knew I'd seen them on APOD before, Doug

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap040112.html
"A leading hypothesis holds that the hole-punch cloud is caused by falling ice-crystals. The ice-crystals could originate in a higher cloud or be facilitated by a passing airplane exhaust. If the air has just the right temperature and moisture content, the falling crystals will absorb water from the air and grow. For this to happen, the water must be so cold that all it needs is a surface to freeze on. The moisture lost from the air increases the evaporation rate from the cloud water droplets so they dissipate to form the hole. The now heavier ice crystals continue to fall and form the more tenuous wispy cloud-like virga seen inside and just below the hole. Water and ice from the virga evaporates before they reach the ground."


Doug

ugordan and Doug thank you very much for the answers

Funky clouds time

These were seen in November '05 near Salobrena in Southern Spain - late afternoon, something to do with the Mediterranean, the Sierra Nevada, and wind.

Doug

And fog - lots and lots of fog - over the Wye in Gloucestershire, as seen from Symonds Yat. A really bad pan - PTGui wont find any keypoints - and to be honest, I can't find too many either

Found an interesting one in my old pictures :
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and this is the context (sorry it's quite blury):
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Would you think this could be a green flash (Kauaii Island) ?
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djellison wrote: "These were seen in November '05 near Salobrena in Southern Spain - late afternoon, something to do with the Mediterranean, the Sierra Nevada, and wind"

Doug - I think those are "mountain lee waves" (http://esaudubon.org/leewave.htm) commonly seen in California mountains, too, where they are known as "Sierra Waves"

Silver clouds. Picture taken on July 2004 in Estonia.

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Ahh - are those noticelull...err...noticeu....nocilleut.....nocieoccinocoe......ett

noctilucent ?

Doug

I recall seeing features like that when I lived in Washington state, Tayfun. As near as I can figure, they seem to be areas of updraft that cut through a thin stratocumulus cloud deck.

Bad ob you nprev, you're only looking at the nice pictures instead of reading the answers

Yes they are. I didn't know the proper term in english.

Nor did I - I had to google it

Doug

Climber, is that camera shake over a 1"-ish exposure of Venus or similar?

Andy, dying of the 'flu

How did you remember this when I dodn't?
You're dead right ! ...so the picture is OT !

Great photos here The foggy landscape remind me a lot of scene of my birth country.

And from my country (Bergerac if you know...), strikes of lightning, taken the 20th May 2005, in the late evening, with a silver camera (a reflex). The three best (and stay always the best shot I've take of lightnings).

Ya got me there, Climber...I suck!

Great, great pics, though. Sure wish that more people overall would take the time just to look up & see all the wonders of the sky, whether it's day or night...

I guess Cirano himself would have used those lightnings as the 7th mean to get to the Moon...
Sunset from home :
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