"Mysterious" celestial phenomena. Celestial phenomena Constellation Ursa Major

We present to you a selection of 20 of the most beautiful natural phenomena associated with the play of light. Truly natural phenomena are indescribable - you have to see it! =)

Let us conditionally divide all light metamorphoses into three subgroups. The first is Water and Ice, the second is Rays and Shadows, and the third is Light contrasts.

Water and Ice

“Near-horizontal Arc”

This phenomenon is also known as a “fire rainbow”. Created in the sky when light is refracted through ice crystals in cirrus clouds. This phenomenon is very rare, since both the ice crystals and the sun must be exactly in a horizontal line for such a spectacular refraction to occur. This particularly successful example was captured in the skies over Spokane in Washington, DC, in 2006.

A couple more examples of fire rainbows

When the sun shines on a climber or other object from above, a shadow is projected onto the fog, creating a curiously enlarged triangular shape. This effect is accompanied by a kind of halo around the object - colored circles of light that appear directly opposite the sun when sunlight is reflected by a cloud of identical water droplets. This natural phenomenon received its name due to the fact that it was most often observed on the low German peaks of Brocken, which are quite accessible to climbers, due to frequent fogs in this area

In a nutshell - it’s a rainbow upside down =) It’s like a huge multi-colored smiley face in the sky) This miracle is achieved due to the refraction of the sun’s rays through horizontal ice crystals in clouds of a certain shape. The phenomenon is concentrated at the zenith, parallel to the horizon, the color range is from blue at the zenith to red towards the horizon. This phenomenon is always in the form of an incomplete circular arc; bringing this situation full circle is the exceptionally rare Infantry Arc, which was first captured on film in 2007

Misty Arc

This strange halo was spotted from the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco - it looked like an all-white rainbow. Like a rainbow, this phenomenon is created due to the refraction of light through water droplets in the clouds, but, unlike a rainbow, due to the small size of the fog droplets, there seems to be a lack of color. Therefore, the rainbow turns out to be colorless - just white) Sailors often refer to them as “sea wolves” or “foggy arcs”

Rainbow halo

When light is scattered back (a mixture of reflection, refraction and diffraction) back to its source, the water droplets in the clouds, the shadow of an object between the cloud and the source can be divided into bands of color. Glory is also translated as unearthly beauty - a fairly accurate name for such a beautiful natural phenomenon) In some parts of China, this phenomenon is even called the Light of Buddha - it is often accompanied by the Brocken Ghost. In the photo, beautiful stripes of color effectively surround the shadow of the airplane opposite the cloud.

Halos are one of the most famous and common optical phenomena, and they appear under many guises. The most common phenomenon is the solar halo phenomenon, caused by the refraction of light by ice crystals in cirrus clouds at high altitude, and the specific shape and orientation of the crystals can create a change in the appearance of the halo. During very cold weather, halos formed by crystals near the ground reflect sunlight between them, sending it in several directions at once - this effect is known as “diamond dust.”

When the sun is at exactly the right angle behind the clouds, the water droplets in them refract the light, creating an intense trail. Coloration, as in a rainbow, is caused by different wavelengths of light - different wavelengths are refracted to different degrees, changing the angle of refraction and therefore the colors of light as we perceive them. In this photo, the iridescence of the cloud is accompanied by a sharply colored rainbow.

A few more photos of this phenomenon

The combination of a low Moon and dark skies often creates lunar arcs, essentially rainbows produced by the light of the moon. Appearing at the opposite end of the sky from the Moon, they usually appear completely white due to the faint coloring, but long exposure photography can capture the true colors, as in this photo taken in Yosemite National Park, California.

A few more photos of the lunar rainbow

This phenomenon appears as a white ring surrounding the sky, always at the same height above the horizon as the Sun. Usually it is possible to catch only fragments of the whole picture. Millions of vertically arranged ice crystals reflect the sun's rays across the sky to create this beautiful phenomenon.

So-called false Suns often appear on the sides of the resulting sphere, such as in this photo

Rainbows can take many forms: multiple arcs, intersecting arcs, red arcs, identical arcs, arcs with colored edges, dark stripes, “spokes” and many others, but what they have in common is that they are all divided into colors - red, orange, yellow , green, blue, indigo and violet. Do you remember from childhood the “memory” of the arrangement of colors in a rainbow - Every Hunter Wants to Know Where the Pheasant Sits? =) Rainbows appear when light is refracted through drops of water in the atmosphere, most often during rain, but haze or fog can also create similar effects, and are much rarer than one might imagine. At all times, many different cultures have attributed many meanings and explanations to rainbows, for example, the ancient Greeks believed that rainbows were the path to heaven, and the Irish believed that in the place where the rainbow ends, the leprechaun buried his pot of gold =)

More information and beautiful photos on the rainbow can be found

Rays and Shadows

A corona is a type of plasma atmosphere that surrounds an astronomical body. The most famous example of such a phenomenon is the corona around the Sun during a total eclipse. It extends thousands of kilometers in space and contains ionized iron heated to almost a million degrees Celsius. During an eclipse, its bright light surrounds the darkened sun and it seems as if a crown of light appears around the luminary

When dark areas or permeable obstacles, such as tree branches or clouds, filter the sun's rays, the rays create entire columns of light emanating from a single source in the sky. This phenomenon, often used in horror films, is usually observed at dawn or dusk and can even be witnessed under the ocean if the sun's rays pass through strips of broken ice. This beautiful photo was taken in Utah National Park

A few more examples

Fata Morgana

The interaction between cold air near ground level and warm air just above can act as a refractive lens and turn upside down the image of objects on the horizon, along which the actual image appears to oscillate. In this photo taken in Thuringia, Germany, the horizon in the distance appears to have disappeared altogether, although the blue portion of the road is simply a reflection of the sky above the horizon. The claim that mirages are completely non-existent images that appear only to people lost in the desert is incorrect, likely confused with the effects of extreme dehydration, which can cause hallucinations. Mirages are always based on real objects, although it is true that they may appear closer due to the mirage effect

The reflection of light by ice crystals with almost perfectly horizontal flat surfaces creates a strong beam. The light source can be the Sun, the Moon, or even artificial light. An interesting feature is that the pillar will have the color of that source. In this photo taken in Finland, the orange sunlight at sunset creates an equally orange gorgeous pillar

A couple more “solar pillars”)

Light contrasts

The collision of charged particles in the upper atmosphere often creates magnificent light patterns in the polar regions. Color depends on the elemental content of the particles - most auroras appear green or red due to oxygen, but nitrogen sometimes creates a deep blue or purple appearance. In the photo - the famous Aurora Borilis or Northern Lights, named after the Roman goddess of the dawn Aurora and the ancient Greek god of the north wind Boreas

This is what the Northern Lights look like from space

Condensation trail

The trails of steam that follow an airplane across the sky are some of the most stunning examples of human intervention in the atmosphere. They are created either by aircraft exhaust or air vortices from the wings and appear only in cold temperatures at high altitudes, condensing into ice droplets and water. In this photo, a bunch of contrails criss-cross the sky, creating a bizarre example of this unnatural phenomenon.

High-altitude winds bend the wakes of rockets, and their small exhaust particles turn sunlight into bright, iridescent colors that are sometimes carried by those same winds thousands of kilometers before they finally dissipate. The photo shows traces of a Minotaur missile launched from the US Air Force Base in Vandenberg, California.

The sky, like many other things around us, scatters polarized light that has a specific electromagnetic orientation. Polarization is always perpendicular to the light path itself, and if there is only one direction of polarization in the light, the light is said to be linearly polarized. This photo was taken with a polarized wide-angle filter lens to show how exciting the electromagnetic charge in the sky looks. Pay attention to what shade the sky has near the horizon, and what color it is at the very top.

Technically invisible to the naked eye, this phenomenon can be captured by leaving the camera with the lens open for at least an hour, or even overnight. The natural rotation of the Earth causes the stars in the sky to move across the horizon, creating remarkable trails in their wake. The only star in the evening sky that is always in one place is, of course, Polaris, since it is actually on the same axis with the Earth and its vibrations are noticeable only at the North Pole. The same would be true in the south, but there is no star bright enough to observe a similar effect

And here is a photo from the pole)

A faint triangular light seen in the evening sky and extending towards the heavens, the Zodiacal light is easily obscured by light atmospheric pollution or moonlight. This phenomenon is caused by the reflection of sunlight from dust particles in space, known as cosmic dust, hence its spectrum is absolutely identical to that of the Solar System. Solar radiation causes dust particles to slowly grow, creating a majestic constellation of lights gracefully scattered across the sky

The word mirage comes from the French mirage, which has two similar meanings.

1. An optical phenomenon, usually observed in deserts, consisting in the fact that in addition to objects in their true position, their imaginary images are visible; with a mirage, objects hidden behind the horizon become visible; may be the result of bending light rays in unevenly heated layers of air;

2. Deceptive vision; something apparent, ghostly.

As is known, light propagates in a straight line only in a homogeneous medium. At the boundary of two media, the light beam is refracted, that is, it deviates slightly from the original path. Such a heterogeneous medium is, in particular, the air of the earth's atmosphere: its density increases near the earth's surface. The beam of light is bent, and as a result, the luminaries appear somewhat shifted, “raised” relative to their true positions in the sky. This phenomenon is called refraction (from the Latin refractus - “refracted”). Due to refraction, virtual images of individual objects - mirages - can appear in the atmosphere.

People have seen mirages since ancient times, about which many legends have been preserved. Particularly colorful stories about the mirages of Palestine were left by the crusaders, whom, however, no one particularly believed. The knights really loved to lie about the wonders of the East. :))) The ancient Egyptians believed that a mirage was a ghost of a country that no longer exists in the world. A beautiful belief said that every place on Earth has its own soul. Centuries have passed, and the fairy tale has lost its former meaning, turning into a natural phenomenon about which everything is known and nothing at the same time.

On the one hand, it is difficult to find a person who, at least once in his life, has not seen the simplest mirage - a blue lake on a hot highway. Opticians will explain this phenomenon clearly, with drawings and formulas. On the other hand, thousands of people have observed literally hanging cities, quaint castles and even entire armies in the sky, but here experts have no explanation for this natural phenomenon. It is almost impossible to study mirages, because they do not appear by order. Their owner, Fata Morgana, is always original and unpredictable.

Mirages come, relatively speaking, of three types. Conditionally - because these atmospheric phenomena are very diverse in their form and in the reasons that cause them.

Atmospheric mirages are divided into three classes: lake, or lower; upper (they appear directly in the sky) or distant vision mirages; lateral mirages.

A more complex type of mirage is called Fata Morgana. The types of mirages usually include mirages - werewolves, ghost mirages, "Flying Dutchmen".

Lower (lake) mirage

Inferior mirages occur primarily in cases where the layers of air near the surface of the Earth (for example, in a desert) are so heated that the rays of light emanating from objects are strongly bent. Having described an arc at the surface, they go from bottom to top. Then you can suddenly see trees and houses, as if reflected in the water. In fact, these are inverted images of distant landscapes.

If on a hot summer day you stand on the railway track or a hill above it, when the sun is slightly to the side or to the side and slightly in front of the railway track, then you can see how the rails two or three kilometers away from us seem to be plunging into a sparkling lake, as if the tracks were flooded flood. Let's try to get closer to the "lake" - it will move away, and no matter how much we walk towards it, it will invariably be 2-3 kilometers away from us.

Such “lake” mirages drove desert travelers, languishing from heat and thirst, to despair. They also saw the coveted water 2-3 kilometers away, they wandered towards it with all their strength, but the water receded and then seemed to dissolve in the air.

The French scientist Gaspard Monge, who took part in Napoleon's Egyptian campaign, describes his impressions of the lake mirage as follows:
“When the surface of the earth is strongly heated by the Sun and is just beginning to cool before the onset of twilight, the familiar terrain no longer extends to the horizon as during the day, but turns, as it seems, at about one league into a continuous flood. The villages located further away look as if islands in the middle of a lost lake. Under each village there is an overturned image of it, only it is not sharp, small details are not visible, like a reflection in the water, shaken by the wind. If you begin to approach a village, which seems to be surrounded by a flood, the shore of the imaginary water keeps moving away, a water arm, separating us from the village, gradually narrows until it disappears completely, and the lake now begins behind this village, reflecting the villages located further."

The nature of the lake mirage has been studied in detail. The sun's rays heat the soil, which heats the lower layer of air. It, in turn, rushes upward, immediately being replaced by a new one, which heats up and flows upward. Light rays always bend from warm layers towards cooler ones. In physics, this phenomenon is called refraction and has been known since the time of Ptolemy. Rays from the bright sky near the horizon, heading towards the earth, bend upward above it and reach our eye at an angle from below, as if reflected from something above the earth itself. We see, of course, a piece of blue sky, only below where it actually is. And the effect of shine and shimmer is caused by the heterogeneity of the flow of warm air rising from the hot surface.

Mirages lead to victims. The physical explanation of the phenomenon of mirages does not in the least alleviate the fate of travelers misled by the ephemeral oasis. In order to protect people brought into the desert from the risk of getting lost and dying of thirst, special maps are drawn up marking the places where mirages are usually observed. These guides indicate where wells can be seen, and where palm groves and even mountain ranges can be seen.

Caravans in the Erg-er-Ravi desert in North Africa are especially often victims of mirages. People see oases “with their own eyes” at a distance of 2-3 kilometers, which in reality are at least 700 kilometers away! Thus, 360 kilometers from the Bir-Ula oasis, a caravan led by an experienced guide fell victim to a mirage. 60 people and 90 camels died as they followed the mirage, which carried them 60 kilometers away from the well.

Superior mirage (distance vision mirage)

This type of mirages is no more complex in origin than “lake” ones, but more diverse. They are usually called "distant vision mirages."

The air is heated from the Earth's surface, and its temperature drops with height. However, if above the layer of cool air there is a warmer (brought, for example, by southern winds) and very rarefied air layer, and the transition between them is quite sharp, then the refraction increases significantly. Rays of light coming from objects on Earth describe something like an arc and return down, sometimes tens, even hundreds of kilometers from their source. Then a “raising of the horizon” or superior mirage is observed.

On a clear morning, residents of the Côte d'Azur of France have seen more than once how, on the horizon of the Mediterranean Sea, where the water merges with the sky, the chain of Corsican mountains rises from the sea, about two hundred kilometers from the Côte d'Azur.

In the same case, if this happens in the desert itself, the surface of which and the adjacent layers of air are heated by the sun, the air pressure at the top may turn out to be high, the rays will begin to bend in the other direction. And then curious phenomena will occur with those rays that, having reflected from the object, should have immediately buried themselves in the ground. But no, they will turn upward and, having passed perigee somewhere near the surface itself, will go into it.

In Aristotle's Meteorology, a typical example is given of how residents of Syracuse sometimes saw the coast of continental Italy for several hours, although it was 150 km away. Such phenomena are also caused by the redistribution of warm and cold layers of air. in the direction of the last segment of the path of the light beam.

Side mirages

This type of mirage can occur in cases where layers of air of the same density are located in the atmosphere not horizontally, as usual, but obliquely or even vertically. Such conditions are created in the summer, in the morning shortly after sunrise, on the rocky shores of the sea or lake, when the shore is already illuminated by the Sun, and the surface of the water and the air above it are still cold.

Lateral mirages have been repeatedly observed on Lake Geneva. We saw a boat approaching the shore, and next to it exactly the same boat was moving away from the shore. A side mirage can appear near a stone wall of a house heated by the Sun, and even on the side of a heated stove. And the Dutch astronomer and popularizer of science Marcel Minnaert proposed the following optical trick: “Stand at a long wall (at least 10 m) at arm’s length and look at a shiny metal object that your friend is gradually bringing closer to the wall at the other end. When the object is on "A few centimeters from the wall, its contours will be distorted, and you will see its reflection on the wall, as if it were a mirror. On a very hot day there may even be two images."

The nature of this mirage is exactly the same as that of the lake. Of course, the rays of light are reflected not from the wall, but from the hotter layer of air adjacent to it.

Fata Morgana

Fata Morgana is a complex optical phenomenon in the atmosphere, consisting of several forms of mirages, in which distant objects are visible repeatedly and with various distortions. No convincing explanation has yet been found for this most mysterious type of mirage. But, there are many theories. And we will present one of them here.

If, for example, we follow the Fraser-Mach theory, then for Fata Morgana to occur it is necessary that the dependence of air temperature on altitude be nonlinear. At first, the temperature increases with altitude, but from a certain level the rate of its increase decreases. Scientists call a similar temperature profile, only with a steeper “turn,” an air lens. Meteorologists have substantiated the existence of such an effect, but it is too early to say that it is the cause of Fata Morgana.

Mirages got their name in honor of the fairy-tale heroine Fata Morgana or, translated from Italian, fairy Morgana. They say that she is the half-sister of King Arthur, the rejected lover of Lancelot, who settled out of grief at the bottom of the sea, in a crystal palace, and since then has been deceiving sailors with ghostly visions.

In 1902, Robert Wood, an American scientist who not without reason earned the nickname “the wizard of the physics laboratory,” photographed two boys peacefully wandering through the waters of the Chesapeake Bay between yachts. Moreover, the height of the boys in the photograph exceeded 3 meters.

One man in 1852, from a distance of 4 km, saw the Strasbourg Bell Tower at a distance, as it seemed to him, of two kilometers. The image was gigantic, as if the bell tower appeared before him enlarged 20 times.

In March 1898, at night, the crew of the Bremen ship Matador, while crossing the South Pacific Ocean, saw a strange haze. All this happened on the seventh bell of the night, in other words, half an hour before midnight. A ship appeared on the leeward side, fighting the storm. It was very strange, because around the Matador the water was completely calm. But the sailboat seen from the Matador was flooded by furious waves, rolling over it. The captain of the "Matador" Gerkins, despite the complete calm, ordered all the sails to be reefed, fearing that the unknown sailing ship would bring the wind with it... Meanwhile, the sailing ship approached. The waves carried him straight towards the Matador. And suddenly the ship flew away in a southerly direction, taking with it a mysterious storm, and from the deck of the Matador one could see how the bright light in the captain's cabin suddenly went out. Later they learned that on the same night and at the same time, one Danish ship actually got into a storm, and a lamp exploded in its captain's cabin. When the time and degrees of longitude of the two ships were compared, it turned out that the distance between the Matador and the other Danish ship at the time the mirage appeared was about 1,700 km.

Fata Morgana is a complex mirage. For such a mirage to occur, the dependence of temperature on altitude must be nonlinear; the temperature initially increases with altitude, but from a certain level the rate of its growth decreases. A similar temperature profile, only with a steeper break somewhere in the middle, can create a triple-image mirage.

"Flying Dutchman"

Since ancient times, there has been a legend about a ghost ship - the Flying Dutchman. Its captain was convicted of blasphemy to forever rush through the seas and oceans without dropping anchor anywhere. The meeting with this terrible sailing ship, according to the sailors, foreshadowed a shipwreck.

Many said that they saw this ship with their own eyes. Moreover, all the stories were similar: the Flying Dutchman suddenly appeared in front of the ships, completely silent, sailed straight towards them, not responding to signals, and then just as suddenly disappeared into the fog.

This old legend probably originated from the upper mirages. Sailors saw reflections of distant ships that were not visible under normal conditions, each time mistaking them for a mystical sailboat.

At 11 a.m. on December 10, 1941, the crew of the British transport Vendor, located in the Maldives, noticed a burning ship on the horizon. "Vendor" went to the rescue of those in distress, but an hour later the burning ship fell on its side and sank. "Vendor" approached the supposed place of the ship's death, but, despite a thorough search, did not find not only any debris, but even stains of fuel oil. At the port of destination, in India, the commander of the Vendor learned that at the very moment when his team observed the tragedy, a cruiser was sinking, attacked by Japanese torpedo bombers near Ceylon. The distance between the ships at that time was 900 km.

So, if you believe this message, sometimes you can see what is hidden beyond the distant horizon. But how is this possible?

How does light travel? A spoon in a glass of tea seems broken to us. Why? The reason is the different densities of water and air. Passing from one medium to another - from less dense air to more dense water, rays of light are refracted, change their straight path, and deviate towards a denser medium. This is a law of physics.

In the air, light rays are also not straight. When a ray of light from an air layer of one density enters a layer of another density, it is deflected. Most often, the refraction of light rays in the air is insignificant, the images of visible objects are not shifted or noticeably distorted. But it also happens differently.

This is what a ship captain once observed near the North Pole. The ship sailed among ice hummocks and fragments of ice fields, sparkling in the rays of the blinding sun. Suddenly objects in the distance rose up and hung in the air. Huge ice mountains, snow fields with ice hummocks, and a wavy coast with hills appeared before the astonished sailors. An even more amazing picture was observed in 1878 by American soldiers from Fort Abraham Lincoln. Half an hour before this mirage, a detachment came out of the fort, and then they were seen marching across the sky! They started talking about the fact that the detachment had died, these were the souls of the soldiers. Mystic? No!

Under certain circumstances, “atmospheric mirrors” are formed in the air. One of the air layers acquires the ability to reflect light rays. This happens early in the morning, when the lower layers of air are still very cool from contact with the ground, and the upper layers are warmer. At the same time, one of the upper layers of air begins to reflect from itself, like a mirror, everything that is on the earth's surface. In such conditions, you can also see what is beyond the horizon. Distant islands, mountains, and sailing ships appear in the air. So one traveler saw on the seashore in Italy an inverted image of an entire city hanging in the air. Houses, towers, and streets were clearly visible. Amazed, he hastened to sketch what he saw, and then, after walking several kilometers, he came to the very city whose image he had seen in the air earlier.

An example closer to us: forty kilometers from St. Petersburg, on the shores of the Gulf of Finland, is the city of Lomonosov. St. Petersburg is usually very poorly visible from here. However, there are days when city residents see it clearly. His image appears in the air. Then from Lomonosov you can clearly see the reflection of the Neva River, bridges, and tall buildings.

Mirages werewolves

A French colonial detachment was crossing the Algerian desert. Ahead, about six kilometers from him, a flock of flamingos walked in single file. But when the birds crossed the border of the mirage, their legs stretched out and separated, instead of two, each had four. Neither give nor take - an Arab horseman in a white robe. The detachment commander, alarmed, sent a scout to check what kind of people were in the desert. When the soldier himself entered the zone of curvature of the sun's rays, he, of course, figured out who he was dealing with. But... he brought fear to his comrades! His horse's legs became so long that he seemed to be sitting on a fantastic monster.

Other visions still baffle us today. Let’s open, for example, the book “Mirages of the Arctic.” It describes a lot of mysterious things and, in particular, werewolf mirages observed by the Swedish polar explorer Nordenskiöld: “One day a bear, whose approach was expected and which everyone clearly saw, instead of approaching with its usual soft gait, zigzag and sniffing the air, wondering if the strangers were good enough for him to eat, just at the moment of the sniper's sight... he spread his gigantic wings and flew away in the form of a small green seagull. Another time, during the same sleigh ride, the hunters, being in a tent pitched for rest, we heard the cry of the cook fiddling around it: “Bear, big bear! No - a deer, a very small deer." At the same moment, a shot was heard from the tent, and the killed "bear-deer" turned out to be a small arctic fox, who paid with his life for the honor of pretending to be a large animal for a few moments."

Mirage ghosts

It is also reliably known about ghost mirages. This is how British meteorologist Caroline Botley describes this effect: “On a hot August day in 1962, I was picking flowers. Suddenly, a few meters away from me, I saw a figure, it was trembling and swaying, it was quite massive. I dropped the bouquet of flowers in horror and only then noticed that that the ghost also had a bouquet of flowers and he also dropped it. It was my own reflection. I distinguished all the shades, details, body color in such detail, as if I saw myself in the mirror."

Despite the fact that Miss Botley is known throughout America as a weather expert, one would think that this time we are definitely talking about a hallucination. But in 1965, an American tourist photographed a similar ghost. Since then, a dozen photographs of ghost mirages and even one amateur video have appeared. Such phenomena usually occur in the morning, on a hot day, when steam is still rising from the ground. Scientists believe that ghosts are caused not by the refraction of light, but by reflection on the rare fog. But scientists cannot yet speak confidently about the “mechanisms” that create mirages and ghosts. There are more guesses than informed theories...

Interesting cases of observing mirages

At the end, we would like to cite a few more interesting mirages. We tried to arrange them in chronological order.

The scientist K. Flammarion in his book “Atmosphere” provides evidence from the inhabitants of a Belgian city. Citizens of Verviers (name of the city) on July 18, 1815, the day of the Battle of Waterloo (then Napoleon was defeated) saw armed men in the sky. It was even noticeable that one cannon had a broken wheel! And this despite the fact that the battle took place 105 kilometers from Verviers.

In the ancient book "Daily Notes on the Voyage to the Northern Whale Fishing, Containing Research and Findings on the East Coast of Greenland." it speaks of a large city, which was observed in the summer of 1820 by the commander of the ship "Baffin", full of castles and temples, very similar to ancient buildings. The sailor sketched this miraculous phenomenon in detail, but the evidence later, of course, was not confirmed.

Later, in 1840, residents of a small island north of England saw beautiful white buildings in the sky. Since there was nothing like this in their homeland, people considered this to be a confirmation of the fairy tale about the Finn people who lived in the crystal city. The vision of a distant country was repeated 17 years later and hung in the air for three hours.

And on April 3, 1900, the defenders of the Bloemfontein fortress, in England, saw the battle formations of the British army in the sky, and so clearly that they could distinguish the buttons on the red uniforms of the officers. This was taken as a bad omen. Two days later, the capital of the Orange Republic surrendered.

One of the best places in the world to study mirages is Alaska. The appearance of mirages in these parts began to be constantly recorded only in the 19th century. There is even a special society created here for the study of natural optical phenomena, which publishes a journal for observing mirages, and tourists from Canada and the USA are taken by bus to admire the peaks of gigantic mountains that appear straight from the abyss, which then dissolve.

In Alaska, the more severe the cold, the more clearly and beautifully the souls of cities, mountains and various objects appear in the heavens. So, in 1889, a local resident, walking near Mount Fairweather, in the southeast of the peninsula, observed the silhouette of a large city - with skyscrapers, high towers and spiers, temples similar to mosques. The source of the mirage could be thousands of kilometers from Alaska.

Something similar was recently observed by thousands of tourists off the east coast of China in the city of Penglai, Shandong Province. The mists have built a city with modern high-rise buildings, wide city streets filled with people and fast cars. The mirage of high clarity was pleasing to the eye for four hours, and it appeared after the city suffered heavy rains for two days.

Experts in this field say that in the city of Penglai, located on the coast of the Shandong Peninsula, a fairly large number of mirages were recorded throughout its existence, which made the city famous as the home of the gods.

Mirages have been recorded not only over the surface of the earth, but also over the surface of the oceans. Charles Lindbergh, a famous American aviator, made the first ever flight across the Atlantic Ocean in 1927. According to the pilot, two hundred miles from Ireland he saw land: hills and trees. The vision did not disappear for several minutes.

Images of mirages were observed not only from airplanes, but even from space! Soviet cosmonaut Georgy Grechko photographed an ice floe hanging in the air above the clouds from the Salyut spacecraft.

Mirages at our latitude are akin to an anomaly, they are such a rare phenomenon. But if the summer is hot, the wind has definitely died, then this natural phenomenon can visit our sky.

The sultry July was a match for the Goodwill Games. On the beach in Komarov, everyone was sitting in the water, not on the shore. Somewhere at the beginning of the fourth, a one and a half meter gray, slightly blurry circle formed over the coastal part of the bay, not very high in the blue sky. The vacationers froze: what is this? The domes of the distant St. Isaac's Cathedral were refracted in the circle, as if in a lens. Under the large circle shone a smaller one, only upside down, from which rainbow rays emanated. Then the whole picture began to shimmer with all the colors of the rainbow and melted.

That same summer, the mirage was observed by the entire Komarov family from the attic of a country house in the village of Vaskelovo. The stuffy evening did not bring relief, and so they decided to go to bed with the whole family in the hayloft. The windows and doors of the attic were wide open, and the entire horizon was clearly visible in the blue haze. In the west, the horizon suddenly began to turn unusually blue, and soon a clear blue stripe formed above the tops of the trees, and a blue village appeared a little higher above it. With blue two-story houses, streets, a small lake with bushes and trees hanging over it. The picture was by no means frozen - cars drove along the streets and people walked leisurely.

The previous summer was also not without mirages. Galina Sergeevna I. and Anna Ivanovna F. observed an almost mystical mirage from the windows of their house from the seventh floor. Galina Sergeevna's house is located on Composer Street, and the windows face Pargolov. The ladies drank tea and listened to Tchaikovsky's music. The owner of the apartment was the first to draw attention to the horizon. A light golden cloud appeared there. Then it was replaced by a gray stripe, above which appeared... crosses and tombstones. Later, a long alley with fir trees, crosses and a gray crypt became green. Fortunately for the observers, the picture was blurry and short-lived, lasting for about a minute, after which it quickly disappeared. The gray, dilapidated crypt lingered in the sky the longest. Both ladies did not at all fall into mysticism and did not ask heaven for mercy. But I still didn’t want to listen to Tchaikovsky’s music.

Our sky is unique and beautiful. In the morning it lifts our spirits with its bright and light tones, and in the evening its warm colors have a peaceful and calming effect on us.
Sometimes such unusual and beautiful phenomena appear in the sky that you want to admire them for hours. Some of these phenomena are very rare or occur only in certain areas of the globe. We invite you to take a look at the images of the most magnificent and unique phenomena that can be seen in the skies.

This beautiful phenomenon is one of the few that we can observe every day. But there are days when the dawn in the sky looks so amazing that looking at it simply takes your breath away. Like, for example, in this photo. How does such beauty appear in the sky? In fact, the variety of colors at sunset and dawn from pink and red to yellow and brown depends on how our sun shines, namely on the length of its rays. At sunset or sunrise, only part of the rays are visible to us, which is why we can admire such splendor. The brightness of the dawn is affected by the amount of steam and dust particles in the atmosphere: the more of them, the more saturated the color of the dawn.

An emerald ray that looks like something magical is extremely rare. It can be seen in the absence of fog and clouds. During sunrise it is the first ray of sunshine. Often a greenish ray can be seen over the sea. He looks like a green lantern. Unfortunately, the duration of this phenomenon is very short - only a couple of seconds. But you can increase the time you observe this beautiful phenomenon: climb a mountain or move along the deck of a ship at a certain speed. Thus, the American pilot Richard Byrd saw a greenish beam for 35 minutes during his stay at the South Pole. As soon as he noticed it, he immediately directed his plane along the horizon, thereby increasing the time for observing this unusual phenomenon. Since ancient times, the green ray has fascinated people. In the drawings of ancient Egypt you can see the sun with green rays. In Scotland there is a sign: “If you see a green ray, then you will be lucky in love.”

Parhelium is another unusually fascinating phenomenon, one of the varieties of a halo (a luminous ring around the sun). Parhelium looks like a bright rainbow spot at the level of the sun. The appearance of this amazing phenomenon is due to the fact that light is refracted in ice crystals at an altitude of 5-10 km. Light spots may also appear on the parhelic circle.

You can see two suns in the sky during the cold season, when many pieces of ice form in the air. The light of the sun hits the ice crystals, while being reflected from them, like in a mirror. And then the illusion of a second sun arises. It’s as if the luminary drew itself, showed a self-portrait. In ancient times, people did not know that additional suns were just a reflection in the sky. They were afraid of this phenomenon. At the poles of our planet you can observe three, and sometimes as many as eight suns.

The appearance of a rainbow in the sky always brings joy. After all, it is very beautiful and completely harmless, like a thunderstorm or lightning. The rainbow does not touch the ground and begins approximately two kilometers from the ground. But a rainbow can also be found four meters from the ground and even on the grass or in a fountain.

It happens that two rainbows appear in the sky at once. In this case, they say that you can make a wish, and it will definitely come true. We see more than one rainbow because the light is reflected from the rain twice. The order of the spectrum is reversed in it.

An inverted rainbow is a true natural masterpiece. In this case, an anti-aircraft arc is visible in the sky, which arose during certain weather conditions. The light falls on the clouds, reflected in the ice floes. The color of the spectrum is in reverse order: red is at the bottom, and violet is at the top. This phenomenon occurs at the North and South Poles.

A fire rainbow (or ice halo) is a very rare phenomenon in nature. It usually occurs in summer. In this case, a number of conditions must be met: the sun's rays must be located at a certain height, reflected from crystal ice floes in the sky, plus cirrus clouds are required. Then rounded horizontal arcs appear, which shimmer with multi-colored colors and give us an amazing landscape.

The Northern Lights can be observed in the polar regions (usually in spring or autumn). Thanks to this phenomenon, the night becomes as light as day. Often the aurora takes the form of a cloud, streak or spot. It looks like a real masterpiece in the form of a ribbon, reminiscent of a curtain in the sky. The aurora appears due to the disturbances of the sun, which, as we know, is constantly seething and burning. Fiery particles of the sun reaching the Earth form a glow in the sky, releasing a huge amount of energy.

Clouds of silver color appear at the onset of deep twilight. This is a fairly rare phenomenon that can only be seen in summer in northern latitudes. These formations are formed quite high - at an altitude of 70-95 km. They are also called mesospheric. Also, similar clouds can appear on other planets, for example, on Mars.

Sometimes amazing images appear in the sky next to the sun, charming shapes created from clouds of various shapes. It happens that you can see a castle in the sky or huge pillars appear, looking like an inverted tornado. For such clouds to occur, there must be certain weather conditions. Gross clouds appear with thunderstorm winds with the required amount of moisture, when cold air moves under warm air. During a storm, the wind changes its direction and rolls the clouds into tubes.

A mirage occurs when light is refracted. We see an image that doesn't really exist. This phenomenon can be encountered in desert areas or during extreme heat. In this case, the light beam is deviated from its path and refracted, so we see imaginary mirages.

St. Elmo's Fire is a bright glow, a buildup of electrical discharge that occurs during a thunderstorm. You can see these lights on the yards and masts of ships, near an airplane flying through a cloud, and also on the tops of mountains. According to legend, St. Elmo's lights appeared when St. Elmo died during a thunderstorm. Before his death, he promised to help sailors by giving signals whether they were destined to escape during a storm. Now the appearance of these lights is considered a good sign, as it means the patronage of St. Elmo.

Celestial phenomena... Many people witnessed unusual phenomena that occurred both during the day and at night. All this fascinates those who saw these phenomena and raises a lot of questions and disputes among those who were unable to do so.

The medieval philosopher Thomas Aquinas is absolutely right in his statement: A miracle is a phenomenon that contradicts not the laws of nature, but our understanding of these laws.

The 90s of the twentieth century were rich in celestial phenomena. And in the twentieth century, the century of technological progress...

Many people witnessed unusual phenomena that occurred both during the day and at night. All this fascinates those who saw these phenomena and raises a lot of questions and disputes among those who were unable to do so.

The medieval philosopher Thomas Aquinas is absolutely right in his statement: “A miracle is a phenomenon that contradicts not the laws of nature, but our understanding of these laws.”

The 90s of the twentieth century were rich in celestial phenomena. And in the twentieth century, the century of technological progress, throughout all of it...

In a homogeneous medium, light only travels in a straight line, but at the boundary of two media, the light ray is refracted. Such a heterogeneous medium is, in particular, the air of the earth's atmosphere: its density increases near the earth's surface.

The beam of light is bent, and as a result, the luminaries appear somewhat shifted, “raised” relative to their true positions in the sky. This phenomenon is called refraction (from the Latin refractus - “refracted”).

Refraction is especially strong when...

On December 9, between 7.00 and 9.00 local time, an extremely amazing celestial phenomenon occurred over Norway. It is so amazing that it did not make it into world news, and is now discussed only by eyewitnesses (thousands of them) in their blogs.

(One of these eyewitnesses was our reader, Vladimir from Norway, who informed us about this and also managed to take several pictures on his mobile phone and kindly sent the pictures to the editor). At the moment there is no complete...

The heavenly disk from Nebra is one of the most interesting and, according to some scientists, controversial archaeological finds of recent years. This is a bronze disc dating back to 1600 BC. e. It measures 32 cm in diameter (about the same size as a vinyl record) and weighs about 4 pounds.

The disc is painted blue-green and covered with gold leaf symbols. On it are placed a crescent moon, a sun (or full moon), stars, an arched border (which is called a solar boat) and...

I first became acquainted with this amazing phenomenon in 1985 in Moscow. It was a rare stroke of luck - I was holding in my hands the official report of the Coptic Patriarchate about this phenomenon (with photographs!!!), where the Patriarchate confirmed that this phenomenon was not a fiction.

Examples were given of phenomenal healings of people from incurable diseases during this phenomenon. To confirm the truth, the following were given: the full name and surname of the patient, his place of residence, the exact diagnosis, as well as the full name and surname of the treating...

Space and the surroundings of the solar system are saturated with a large amount of “celestial debris”. It consists of fragments of hard rock, like stone, pieces of ice and frozen gases. These could be asteroids or comets revolving around the Sun in complex orbits.

Their size ranges from several kilometers to a millimeter. Such celestial objects bombard the Earth every day, and only thanks to the atmosphere they most often burn up before reaching the surface of the planet.

Throughout history...

IN JANUARY 1995, a German astronomical magazine published a short message, to which all scientific, religious and popular publications on the planet immediately responded. Each publisher drew the attention of its readers to completely different aspects of this message, but the essence boiled down to one thing: the Abode of God had been discovered in the Universe.

After deciphering a series of images transmitted from the Hubble telescope on film...

A new discovery released this week by NASA has major implications for future lunar explorers: Astronauts may find themselves "crackling with electricity like a sock that came out of a hot electric dryer," according to the agency... Forward >>>

Sometimes you can observe unusual phenomena in the sky, for which it is not immediately possible to find a reasonable explanation. If it is not the Sun, not the Moon or stars, and moreover something moving, changing its brightness and color, then many people who are not experienced in observations are inclined to classify the unknown phenomenon as “unidentified flying objects”. Even astronomers sometimes find many reasons that for some time mislead them regarding the nature of this or that “unusual” phenomenon. However, careful observation and the ability to think a little can usually lead to a natural explanation for “unusual” phenomena.

Even if you orient yourself quite well among the constellations, you may accidentally forget the exact position of a particular star in them. Some confusion in the picture of the location of stars can be caused by variable stars, as well as the appearance, albeit rare, of new stars. Planets can also create some confusion, but they are much easier to deal with, since they are observed near the ecliptic and, even to the naked eye, as a rule, look like more permanent objects in the sky than stars. Airplanes flying with their landing lights on can also look like bright objects, and if they move towards the observer, they even seem motionless for some time. Before sunrise or after sunset, it is also possible to observe meteorological balloons, and long-term observations make it possible to notice their movement. At night they are usually not visible.

Rice. 23. The satellite’s entry into the atmosphere is accompanied by a flash of light, very similar to a bright fireball.

Table No. 4

Identification of Observed Objects

When observing individual stars, they appear to move slightly. This is often associated with the phenomenon of flickering, but more often it is explained by an optical illusion, from which no one is spared. Of course, many celestial bodies actually move among the stars: the planets move slowly, the Moon somewhat faster. Small planets, or asteroids, usually change their position slowly from night to night, but when close to Earth they can move much faster. Hot air balloons, airplanes (most often equipped with colored and flashing lights) and satellites move more quickly across the sky; their apparent movement depends significantly on latitude and distance to them. Artificial satellites move across the sky much slower than meteors and fireballs, although their apparent speed depends on the altitude of their orbit (the exception is geostationary satellites). In addition, satellites often disappear when entering the Earth's shadow (and reappear when leaving it). When entering the Earth's atmosphere, a flash of light appears, similar to a fireball, but it moves much more slowly. And finally, the illusion of a faint meteor can be created by nocturnal birds if they, rapidly flying low over the Earth, fall into a strip of light.

“The appearance of luminous foggy formations in the sky can be explained by various reasons, depending on their size. Zodiacal light can only be observed along the ecliptic over the eastern or western horizon. The aurora, especially in its earliest stages, is sometimes mistaken for a cloud illuminated by a distant light source. True noctilucent clouds have a very specific appearance and only appear around midnight. Rocket launches and artificial releases of substances for the purpose of studying the atmosphere produce a colored glow reminiscent of the auroras. In binoculars and telescopes, clusters of stars, galaxies, gas and dust nebulae and rare comets are also visible as small nebulous spots.

The rapid change in color of stars is usually caused by flickering, which is most noticeable in stars located low above the horizon. Refraction can contribute to the appearance of colored fringing of the disks of planets, especially if the latter are located low above the horizon.

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