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Square Rainbows

Shortfatdyke

19:45 / 30.05.02

wondering if any of you more scientific bods can help me with this one. when i was in cornwall recently, i was looking out to sea and on the horizon was what i can only describe as a square rainbow - a block of multicoloured light from sky to sea. it's shape seemed very distinct, which is what confused me as i assumed it was a rainstorm. i've never seen the like of it before, neither had my parents, who also witnessed it.

explanation? i did fantasise about it being lights from a spaceship zapping up sea creatures, but there's probably a far more down to earth, as it were, explanation.

Chuckling Duck

20:13 / 30.05.02

Which direction were you facing, and where on the horizon was the light? What time of day or night was it? Was the light a red to purple spectrum?

Shortfatdyke

06:23 / 31.05.02

as far as i can ascertain, we were looking west-north-west to north-west, it was late afternoon (17.15 hrs ish) and the light was dead centre of the horizon, to my eye. the colours looked like the usual colours of the rainbow, beginning with yellow, i think.

netbanshee

14:35 / 31.05.02

...not very scientific per se, but this reminds me of an illusion that can occur at sea. There's something called "half-mast" I believe where a reflection of light bounces from an object to the distance, generally during dawn and twilight. Navy men (like my grandfather) could sometimes observe it. It appeared, in their case, from the reflection of the top of the boat but it apparantly looked like a sunk ship in the distance...heard it was pretty creepy. Maybe the abberation you saw is similar to this one...

Chuckling Duck

15:10 / 31.05.02

All sorts of objects can throw straight-edged spectrums; prisms, for example. Since there was almost certainly spray or mist in the air, I would guess that you were looking at the reflection of a spectrum thrown by an object reflecting the sun’s light. The object could have have been behind you, or if you were above the ocean’s surface, in front of and below you. Because of incidence/reflection, it could have been to your sides. Were there any large buildings around, any vehicles?

I wish I could be more helpful. I bet we could figure it out if we were there now.

Itzpapalotl

18:16 / 31.05.02

Did it look anything like this:
www.wolkenatlas.de/wolken/rf03.htm
if so it was a Parhelia or a sundog, if thats not it you could browse
http://www.wolkenatlas.de/ as there are loads of nice pictures of all sorts of atmospheric phenomena.

Shortfatdyke

18:21 / 31.05.02

tekum - it was a little like the pic, but had really, really sharp lines.

the reflection off a boat theory is interesting, too.....

thanks all, this is interesting stuff!

Boy in a Suitcase

07:59 / 02.06.02

The other day I was walking through a field, looked up, and noticed a rainbow colored cloud floating through the air. It looked like an air-borne oilslick. Either weird hallucination or horrid pollution.

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