SPECTACULAR BROCKEN SPECTRE ON TOP OF MOUNT ERRIGAL DONEGAL TODAY
Spectacular Brocken spectre from mount Errigal Donegal today photographed by Iain Miller
Broken Spectre from the summit of Errigal today. 😊@wildatlanticway @Indo_Travel_ @barrabest @govisitdonegal pic.twitter.com/H5J4brSIUZ
— Iain Miller (@UniqueAscent) January 18, 2019
The Brocken spectre (or Brocken bow) is an apparently greatly magnified shadow of an observer cast against mist or cloud below the level of a summit or ridge and surrounded by rainbow coloured fringes resulting from the diffraction of light. The effect is an illusion. Depth perception is altered by the mist, causing the shadow to appear more distant and to be interpreted as larger than normally expected.
Actually the Brocken Spectre is what meteorologists call a glory. Most air travellers have already observed glories. They are most easily seen when one is riding on the shadow side of an aircraft above the clouds.
A Brocken Spectre can only be seen when specific conditions are met: The sun must be directly at one's back and there must be many suspended water droplets in the air where the Spectre's glory appears. Sunlight enters the water droplets and reflects off the back of the droplets and the light comes back towards the sun and the observer. This phenomenon is called diffraction and causes the circular rainbow-like bands around the shadow. Even if you are in a group you can only see your own shadow and glory (rainbow) ring, or your own Brocken Spectre. Therefore Brocken Spectres are confined to high-mountain areas when the sun is low.
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Legend has that the name came from the Brocken, the highest peak of the Northern German Harz Mountains. Once a climber was startled by the sudden appearance in the nearby mist of a human figure with a ring of light around its head. Frightened, the climber fell to his death, killed by his own shadow that he saw and the ring of light was his own glory ring.
Kenneth Mc Donagh from the Donegal Weather Channel
2019 CALENDAR NOW ON SALE
2019 Calendar now on sale
You can now purchase the Donegal Weather Channel Calendar 2019. You can purchase the Calendar from the online store
All calendars will be posted out in the middle of November with only a limited amount available. Calendars can be purchased anywhere across the world.
The stunning Leitir Mhic An Bhaird (Lettermacaward) Donegal during May 2018
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The orange and red tints that the Moon sometimes take on rising and setting are caused by the particles in the Earth's atmosphere. When light (or more specifically, packets of light called photons) from an astronomical object passes through the Earth's atmosphere, it scatters off of particles in the latter.
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Photos from this angle I have not seen yet and it was wonderful to finally capture that moment.
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