Light pillars in the sky. Light pillar Light pillars in the sky
The pillars of light created by the Sun are often mistaken for mystical manifestations of divine light, and the legends about the fiery swords of the heavenly inhabitants most likely arose due to an amazing natural phenomenon - when a setting or rising Luminary illuminates cirrus clouds, and the solar pillar, as it were, binds them to the earth.
Light rays burst into the atmosphere of our planet at a speed exceeding 300 thousand km/s. Colliding with air, they often form unusual optical effects and illusions of incredible beauty, including light pillars, the thickness of which is equal to the diameter of the Sun or another light source that gave rise to them.
By themselves, light pillars are a fairly common variant of a halo (an optical phenomenon around a light source) - and people who first see such an interaction of ice crystals with the light of celestial bodies often have doubts about their natural origin, so strongly they resemble spotlight beams.
They are light pillars in the sky, an absolutely vertical radiant column with an inexhaustible supply of energy, which stretches from the Sun or Moon to the Earth or, conversely, into the sky, during their sunrise or sunset in the sky (at this time they must be near the horizon). The observer, depending on his location, may well observe this phenomenon both above and below the star.
Another interesting feature of the light column is that it will necessarily be the same color as the source whose rays gave rise to it. For example, if the Sun is red - then red, orange - orange.
Most often, this phenomenon can be seen in winter at sub-zero temperatures (below -20 ° C), when a huge amount of ice crystals are formed in the atmosphere that can reflect light rays. It is not uncommon for solar pillars to be seen even at higher temperatures (depending on other climatic conditions accompanying the event).
Education
We can observe this amazing phenomenon thanks to the play of light with ice crystals that form in the upper atmosphere - usually in cirrus (even in cirrostratus) clouds, which are located at a distance exceeding 8 thousand km above sea level. During the cold season, these crystals form somewhat lower, making the light columns much easier to notice, and besides, they take on a clearer shape during this period.
The light column appears as follows:
- The light of the Sun (Moon) bounces off falling flat hexagonal or columnar tiny ice crystals. Falling, hexagonal crystals take an absolutely flat, horizontal position. Pillar-shaped - on the contrary, they go down in standing rows. "Hanging" in a cold atmosphere, the crystals play the role of a prism, refracting and reflecting a beam of light.
- The light, reflected, visually expands and forms a lens floating in the air, from which a strong beam emerges - a solar column. The observer will see this amazing phenomenon only if the face that reflects the light is turned towards his eye.
- Which crystals will create a light column will depend on where exactly at that moment the heavenly body will be. If it is at an angle of six degrees above the surface of the Earth, then the pillars of light will be formed by flat hexagonal crystals, but if the Sun (Moon) is at an angle of twenty degrees above sea level, a shining column will form columnar crystals.
A column of light often accompanies the parhelic circle in the form of a light band that goes around the entire sky at the same height as the heavenly body. If the observer is lucky, he will be able to see not only a shining column, but also a closed circle passing through the real Sun.
The phenomenon of artificial origin
The source of light for the occurrence of this phenomenon can be not only celestial bodies, but also artificial devices (for example, searchlights, garden or city lights) located on the earth's surface. The lower the light source is, the longer the beam will be - which is why artificial pillars often turn out to be longer than those formed with the help of natural luminaries.
Usually, ice crystals evaporate before reaching the earth's surface when the temperature is below zero, and flat falling ice crystals near the ground are transformed into some kind of ice fog, which is able to reflect ground lights, forming columns that are extremely similar to light pillars.
In the northern regions of the globe in a frosty winter, you can see an amazing phenomenon - light pillars.
It would seem that this is an ordinary light from a searchlight turned into the sky. However, these phenomena are of natural origin.
General information
In winter, when the air temperature drops to -20C, you can see the appearance of horizontal columns of light in the sky. They form after sunset or before sunrise when the Sun is on the horizon. For the appearance of this amazing atmospheric phenomenon, there must be high humidity and cold weather.
An interesting fact: for a long time people believed that this natural phenomenon was of divine origin, many supernatural signs were attributed to it. One of the legends said that a person who saw this phenomenon on the horizon would become powerful and rich, the heavenly bodies would give him their patronage. In some parts of the world, people still believe that the appearance of such phenomena, which occur under the influence of light and are observed during the cold season, promises an increase in frost.
With the development of ufology, incredible facts began to appear that the pillars of light are formed by aliens who are watching us from their saucers, approaching the earth. Often there were drawings and shots in videos of how a person using a luminous column rises into a plate to the aliens, and then does not remember anything about it.
Physicists have dispelled all myths about the origin of light pillars. It turned out that the appearance of such a vertical light depends on the saturation of cirrus and air with ice crystals. In frosty weather, crystals close to the surface of the earth reflect the light of the moon, planets, stars or the sun. The reason for the formation of this unusual phenomenon can also be ordinary lights, headlights of cars and spotlights.
Description of the phenomenon
Planets, constellations and the Sun send rays to our planet, which, when they meet with ice crystals in cold regions, are refracted, forming a luminous column.
A sun pillar can hardly be called a natural phenomenon, it looks so much like a vertical beam of a searchlight. The thickness of the column of light is usually equal to the diameter of the source that sent the beam to the ground. The column is quite powerful and bright, inside it you can see how ice crystals shimmer, reflecting.
How do
The ice crystals involved in the formation of this natural phenomenon have a flat hexagonal shape, or are a small column. A beam of light can be reflected from any face, so the location of the crystals plays an important role.
During the appearance, as the light column is also called, it is clear that it not only has the same diameter as the light source that forms it, but also reflects its color. Quite often, in frosty weather, having left the city limits, one can observe halos rushing into the sky, of completely different colors. The lower the source, the brighter and richer the natural phenomenon.
A phenomenon that is considered similar to solar pillars is called. However, the needles reflect short streaks of light and their appearance does not last long. The reason for the appearance of needles is the same - during frosty winter weather at low temperatures, ice crystals that have sunk to the ground reflect light that hits them from small sources. Even a flashlight can cause short, sharp streaks of light to reflect off ice crystals.
artificial origin
Knowing the peculiarity of the formation of a light column, many inhabitants of the northern regions of the planet have learned to create a beautiful glow. In order to get multi-colored halos of artificial origin, people specially decorate large-diameter lamps in different colors and place them at the same height. Such a phenomenon is called a "light forest" and it is very similar to the sun pillars formed when a beam is reflected from natural light sources - the planets.
Most often, the appearance of a “light forest” is due to the presence of artificial sources of light reflection. They can be street lights, light bulbs, headlights of cars. People have long known how to artificially create a light forest, because this atmospheric phenomenon is amazingly beautiful.
Varieties
The phenomenon, which is an optical effect that occurs due to the dispersion of light in ice crystals, is called a halo. Quite often in the cold season you can see a luminous circle around the Sun or a street lamp - this is the halo. There are many varieties of halo: sun pillars and "light forest" are also among them.
The appearance of light pillars and halo provides frosty weather and humid air, saturated with crystals of frozen water.
Sometimes the sun column is accompanied by another natural phenomenon - the parhelic circle. This is a bright band that can be seen in the sky at the height of the Sun. It looks like a vicious circle surrounding the Sun.
The nature of our planet is surprisingly diverse, it gives us amazing discoveries every day. Solar pillars are often equated with the northern lights, but the origin of these natural phenomena is completely different.
The most interesting phenomenon in nature, which is observed quite often, is the appearance of light pillars, as if connecting heaven and earth. Many peoples took their appearance for various omens - both good and ominous.Someone declared them a manifestation of divine favor, and someone - a threat of severe destruction, pestilence and hunger.
WHAT IS THIS PHENOMENON
Light pillars that appear in the sky are perfectly vertical, brightly shining columns, stretching from the sun (or moon) to the earth or from it to the luminary during sunset or sunrise, that is, when the light source is low, near the horizon. You can see them above or below the sun (moon), it all depends on the location of the observer. The color of the column is identical to the shade of the luminary at this moment: if it is yellow, then the phenomenon is the same.
Light (or solar) column (English Light pillar) - one of the most frequent types of halo, a visual phenomenon, an optical effect, which is a vertical strip of light stretching from the sun during its sunset or sunrise. The phenomenon is caused by hexagonal flat or columnar ice crystals with nearly horizontal parallel flat surfaces.
How do scientists interpret Light pillars - a very common variant of the halo - the so-called optical phenomenon that appears under certain conditions around a light source? When you first see this phenomenon, it is difficult to believe in the natural nature of its origin - the resemblance to the beams of a searchlight is so clear.
In fact, the light of the sun (or moon) interacts with ice crystals formed in the layers of the atmosphere, which reflect it. Such an explanation is too simple, it characterizes the mechanism of the appearance of the phenomenon, but does not clarify the conditions under which the emergence of light pillars becomes possible. Let's figure out under what circumstances this phenomenon occurs and what it means.
PILLARS OF LIGHT: HOW AND WHY WE SEE THEM
Most often, such optical effects appear in the cold season. This is due to the fact that for the appearance of a column in the Earth's atmosphere, ice crystals must form, and the sun must be low enough. At low air temperatures in the atmosphere, many hexagonal ice crystals are formed that can reflect light rays.
But it is not uncommon for a similar effect to occur in the warmer season. This can occur at a time when cirrus clouds are observed in the sky - they also form columnar hexagonal ice crystals.
Solar or lunar rays, bursting into the atmosphere at a speed of over 300 thousand km per second, collide with ice crystals suspended in the air. It is this circumstance that is fundamental for the appearance of a halo. The play of light with these ice floes allows you to observe a stunning phenomenon that forms at an altitude of about 8 km. In frost, ice crystals form much lower, and thanks to this, the light pillars (the photo is presented in the article) have very clear contours and are visually perceived better. The spectacle is amazing - beautiful and exciting.
PILLAR FORMATION
Scientists trace several options for the formation of an optical effect, depending on the shape of the crystals and the location of the light source. Light columns appear as follows: If the ice crystals have a flat hexagonal shape, then when they fall, they take a horizontal position, while the columnar ones fall in even standing rows. Hanging in the cold air, they act as a prism, refracting the light beam that hits them.
The reflected light forms a kind of lens that floats in the air and passes a powerful beam through itself. Which crystals are involved in creating such an effect (flat or columnar) depends on the location of the luminary at that moment. In a position at an angle of 6˚ to the surface of the earth, these are flat hexagons. If the sun is at an angle of 20˚, then the light column is formed by refraction in columnar crystals.
From the blogs: - ".. My grandmother told me that people saw pillars of light in the sky before the war. They went to the factory with their friends for the morning shift, and there was a crowd in front of the entrance. They ask what they don’t enter, and they show them to the sky. And there are wide, bright stripes in the dawn sky.
I don’t know if these pillars are like that or not…”
ARTIFICIAL PHENOMENON
So, cold and humidity are the main components in the emergence of favorable conditions for the formation of suspended ice crystals in the Earth's atmosphere, cut from six sides. Light from various sources can be refracted in them - both from celestial and street spotlights or car headlights. The light refracted in them gives a specific effect, which is a sharply defined bright strip perpendicular to the ground. Residents of the northern cities are witnesses of a rare phenomenon, the name of which is the light forest.
This happens because falling flat hexagonal crystals in winter do not evaporate on their way to the ground due to sub-zero temperatures, but turn into a kind of thick fog that can reflect the light of ground sources and form light pillars, very similar to natural ones. Such beams turn out to be much longer, since the light source is located below.
THE DIFFERENCE FROM THE NORTHERN LIGHTS
The origin of these two optical phenomena is different. Auroras are the product of flashes of geomagnetic storms, when the planet's magnetic field is disturbed by "gusts" of the solar wind. It is they who, invading the Earth's magnetosphere, make it glow like the kinescope of a television receiver does. Usually the northern lights are manifested by greenish-lilac flashes over a large area of the sky.
JAPANESE POSTS
In Osaka, Japan, on August 21, immediately after lightning strikes and a severe thunderstorm began, some residents were shocked by an unusual phenomenon, light pillars. Photos taken from Twitter. One of the authors writes that he only wanted to photograph the lightning, but it turned out to photograph such a pillar that arose immediately after the lightning strike. He called this phenomenon "Strike from Laputa" (Laputa is a flying city in the clouds).
A light (or sun) column is one of the most common types of halo. This is a visual atmospheric phenomenon, an optical effect, which is a vertical strip of light stretching from the sun during its sunset or sunrise. The phenomenon is caused by hexagonal flat or columnar ice crystals with nearly horizontal parallel flat surfaces. Flat crystals suspended in the air cause solar pillars if the sun is at a height of 6 degrees above the horizon or behind it, columnar crystals - if the sun is at a height of 20 degrees above the horizon. Crystals tend to take a horizontal position when falling in the air, and the shape of the light column depends on their relative position.
A column of light occurs when sunlight shines from the surfaces of tiny ice crystals, which are ice plates or rods with a hexagonal section, suspended in the air. Such crystals form in high cirrus clouds, most often in cirrostratus. At low temperatures, similar crystals can also form in the lower layers of the atmosphere. Therefore, light pillars are more often observed in the cold season. When forming a light column, the light is either from the top or bottom surface of the ice plate, or from the ends or faces of the ice rod.
In rare cases, a column of light may be accompanied by a so-called parhelic circle. It is a bright band that is visible in the sky at the same height as the Sun. Under favorable conditions, it constitutes a vicious circle passing through the Sun and false Suns.
Light pillars often form around the moon, city lights, and other bright light sources. Pillars emanating from low-lying light sources are usually much longer than solar or lunar pillars. The closer the observer is to the light column, the less the location of the crystals in space affects the appearance of the column.
According to an ancient legend, a person who sees a pillar of light will gain untold wealth and happiness. After all, now he was chosen, and a divine sign appeared to him.
Some particularly skeptical observers do not see both mystical and natural root causes in the phenomenon, considering the light pillars to be the rays of ordinary searchlights.
With the advent of UFO stories and the rise of the ufology craze, the phenomenon has been associated with the long-awaited arrival of space aliens. But if you happen to see a pillar of light, don't be alarmed! This is not an alien ship trying to draw another victim on board, but ice particles of a completely natural origin reflect the light of the Moon or the Sun.
Pillars of light over lanterns.
If in winter, on a quiet, frosty night, you go out into the city square, lit by lanterns, and if there are some favorable circumstances, which will be discussed a little later, then you may be lucky enough to be a witness to a rare spectacular spectacle: you will see a forest of luminous pillars above the square . The light column stands strictly vertically above each lantern and goes far up. You can go around the lantern from all sides, the light pole will remain in its place.
M. Minnart's book "Light and Color in Nature" briefly talks about this phenomenon. It says that it is observed in Canada and in Russia and that the reason for it is the reflection of light by small ice particles suspended in the air. From this it is still quite a long way to a detailed explanation of the mechanism of the appearance of light pillars.
There is no doubt that small snowflakes or ice flakes in the atmosphere are involved in the creation of light pillars. Snowflakes and ice flakes illuminated by a lantern shine as if they themselves glow. But why is only the pole above the lantern glowing?
By doing a simple experiment, you will see that the appearance of the pillars is due to the stereo effect. You look at the lantern with your right eye closed, and instead of a pillar you see a vertical strip of sparkling snowflakes in the air between the eye and the lantern, but slightly higher than it. You see the same stripe when you look with your left eye closed - these are snowflakes sparkling in another area, namely in the one that is between the right eye and the lantern. Now let's open both eyes: two images, two sparkling strips merge, and you see a light pillar. Already above the lantern. We emphasize once again - this is a kind of optical illusion, you see two different luminous stripes, two different volumes of air with their sparkling particles - one in front of the right eye and the other in front of the left.
Now let's think: why are the sparkling stripes vertical and why do snowflakes sparkle only when they fall into a vertical plane passing through the eye and through the light source? Why are snowflakes not visible outside this plane?
Snowflakes are, as a rule, flat stars: in the center there is a small hexagon, six rays grow from its corners with branches parallel to the edges of the hexagon. Other branches grow from these branches, and as a result, the asterisk can take quite complex forms. The process of crystallization of moisture comes from the center of the snowflake, and this allows us to understand what intermediate forms the asterisk takes.
In the initial stage, ice particles stick to the corners of a regular hexagon and their chains from two adjacent corners grow towards each other. From such chains, a new, geometrically similar, larger hexagon grows, or, in other words, the initially formed hexagon grows.
But then a moment comes when the growing chains do not have time to meet, and new chains are already starting to grow at the corners. And then microscopic flat ice fir-trees with branches parallel to the sides of the hexagon are obtained at the corners. Further on, new sticks grow on the rays, and the star becomes more and more complex.
If there is little moisture in the atmosphere, the process ends at a relatively early stage and small snowflakes in the form of hexagons and the simplest stars are born in the air. As we shall see later, this is one of the "certain favorable circumstances" necessary for the emergence of light pillars.
Now let's talk about how these tiny snowflakes behave when falling slowly in calm weather.
Strictly speaking, it would be necessary to conduct studies of falling snowflakes in real conditions, say, with the help of filming. But, assuming that the behavior of a snowflake is mainly determined by its shape, you can experiment with a model of relatively large sizes. The author did such experiments together with the engineer A. A. Borodin, in the experiments models of snowflakes cut out of paper were used. The following results were obtained:
1. "Snowflakes" with two mutually perpendicular axes of symmetry autorotate. Autorotation in aerodynamics is the movement of a body, accompanied by rotation due to interaction with the atmosphere.
3. The greater the elongation of the "snowflake", or the ratio of the larger axis to the smaller one, the faster the rotation is with the same area.
4. Regular hexagons and six-pointed stars rotate around an axis connecting opposite angles and rays. This is how our paper "snowflakes" were autorotated.
The first drawing shows a lantern on a pole and an observer, and it is assumed that the plane of the drawing passes through the center of the luminous part of the lantern (for example, through the center of a ball of white frosted glass) and through the eye of the observer. In the same plane there are four snowflakes - 1, 2, 3, 4. Their axes of rotation are perpendicular to the plane of the drawing, and the snowflakes themselves are shown as short dashes at the moment of their rotation, when the light from the lantern is reflected from the snowflake, as from a mirror , gets into the eye. The four snowflakes shown sparkle twice per revolution, or rather, a little more or less often, as they change their location when falling.
Points 1, 2, 3, 4 with strokes. This is the apparent position of the light points; they create the illusion of a light line. From the position of point 4, it can be seen that the light column may have a section below the lantern, unless it is too illuminated by the direct light of the lantern itself.
Falling and rotating, snowflakes send flashes of light into the eye until they leave the vertical plane "eye - lantern" or until their axis of rotation deviates from the perpendicular to this plane.
The falling speed of a snowflake is small, and the angular velocity and, consequently, the number of light bursts per second can be quite large.
The second figure schematically shows how the lamp and the left (l) and right (r) eyes of the observer are located in the plan, as well as several snowflakes that send light flashes towards the observer. For clarity, the diameter of the lantern, and hence the angles, are greatly exaggerated.
This is done in order to show more clearly that the snowflakes that the observer sees are located within certain angles. That is, the observer sees not lines, but luminous stripes, which ultimately create the illusion of light pillars. It is easy to figure out that the number of snowflakes that are between the lantern and the eye and the shine of which the observer sees will be the greater, the greater the angles αl and αp. One can even calculate the proportion of these visible snowflakes in the total number of snowflakes falling to the ground in space, which is limited by vertical planes passing through the line, a-l and b-l (for the left eye) and c-p and d-p (for the right eyes). This share is quite large, it is approximately equal to (αl + αp): 360.
The relative number of snowflakes can also be calculated, which are outside the angles αl and αp, but nevertheless, in a certain position, direct the reflected light exactly into the eyes of the observer (the position of the autorotation axis of such a snowflake is marked with the number 5 in the second figure). Calculations show that beyond the angles αl and αp the probability of the existence of snowflakes in such a position is extremely small. That is why the observer sees the bright light reflected by the autorotating snowflakes only within the relatively small angles αl and αp sees light pillars.
N. Fadeev
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