Rainbow and clouds on OBP

My daughter and I did a belated Mother's Day hike on Friday - just a beautiful day.

With sunglasses on , we noticed a rainbow in the clouds over Franconia Ridge. With sunglasses off, you couldn't see it at all. Also, some other interesting cloud formations.

http://picasaweb.google.com/gram123456/OBP?feat=directlink

I remember the first trip out to Owl's Head I did. We camped out overnight, which had been constant rain. The sun was poking in and out, but Franconia RIdge was scked in above about 4500 feet. As we climbed the slide we looked out over the valley between Owl's head and Franconia ridge and a beautiful rainbow spread out across it. It was so low that even if Franconia Ridge was clear no one on the other side of the ridge would have seen it....simply awesome!

Brian

NewHampshire said:

It was so low that even if Franconia Ridge was clear no one on the other side of the ridge would have seen it....simply awesome!

Click to expand...

It wouldn't be there for anyone on the ridge--rainbows form away from the sun with respect to the viewer. Any rainbows visible from Franconia Ridge would have been out toward Kinsman Ridge.

Rainbows are caused by internal reflection and dispersive refraction in water droplets. The dropets can be anywhere from a few feet away (as in a rainbow from lawn sprinker) to miles away (as in a rainbow from far-away rain). The rainbow itself is a 40-42 degree radius circle (or part of a circle) centered on the shadow of the observer's head. Thus the apparent location of the rainbow depends on the location of the observer.

More info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow
http://eo.ucar.edu/rainbows/

Doug

I think that is a circumhorizontal arc.

Check this link

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090512.html

Great pics. I love seeing these things.

grouseking

Nice link, grouseking. I had never seen a horizontal rainbow before. Since we couldn't see it with the naked eye, just with sunglasses on, I was surprised the camera picked it up.