Well, for a few days this Winter, I have been seeing a strange red glow in the sky. I have seen it for years, and now I would like to know what it is. It can range from A Light Pink to a Blood Red. It is manly restricted to the Southwestern sky and is sometimes very bright. One thing that I do know is that I live in a very small, rural town in Northern Kansas, so it can't be caused from the lights of the city. It is mainly found during times of high humidity or right after precipitation has fallen. I don't see it everyday, and since it is snowing right as I type, there is a extremely faint glow of that color in the Southwestern sky, but it is still there. Does anybody know what causes this and what it is? Thanks!!
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Well, ..., basically it you see ti on fairly clear days. It is back scatter from the Sun refracting of of dust and moisture and into the red end of the spectrum near sunset and sunrise. I've seen it too.
Read the explanation below:
The phenomenon is linked to Rayleigh Scattering (See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayleigh_sc…
Basically our atmosphere acts as a huge refractive lens. When the Sun is at either horizon light is scattered to towards the red end of the spectrum (longer wave length). This is why we see really rich reds and oranges during the sunrise and sunset. As the Sun rises in the sky light is scattered towards the Blue end of the spectrum (Shorter wavelengths). However. if you look a light reflected off of clouds it is white. Additionally, grey clouds appear grey and so forth. At night because there is little light we see the night sky as black. If the sky were truly some other color then everything would appear tinted with that other color. For example, the Martian sky is redder in appearance because of the amount of hematite dust floating around in the atmosphere this causes light scattering to consistently occur in the red end of the spectrum thus it's atmosphere is tinted red.
Read the explanation below:
The phenomenon is linked to Rayleigh Scattering (See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayleigh_sc…
Basically our atmosphere acts as a huge refractive lens. When the Sun is at either horizon light is scattered to towards the red end of the spectrum (longer wave length). This is why we see really rich reds and oranges during the sunrise and sunset. As the Sun rises in the sky light is scattered towards the Blue end of the spectrum (Shorter wavelengths). However. if you look a light reflected off of clouds it is white. Additionally, grey clouds appear grey and so forth. At night because there is little light we see the night sky as black. If the sky were truly some other color then everything would appear tinted with that other color. For example, the Martian sky is redder in appearance because of the amount of hematite dust floating around in the atmosphere this causes light scattering to consistently occur in the red end of the spectrum thus it's atmosphere is tinted red.