Today, I learned about:

As I have mentioned in two earlier posts in 2022, 16’2022 (2022-01-16) and 58’2022 (2022-02-27), this time of the year in the Northern hemisphere can show the interesting Aurora borealis (Northern lights) and six months from now the time will come for the Southern hemisphere with its Aurora australis (Southern lights). But there is also a different phenomenon that can be present and seen if we are lucky.

Yesterday, I received a message from my good old friend Dina, native from Kazakhstan, who nowadays lives in Ireland. She had gotten a photo from a friend of hers in Uralsk, her home town. You can see the picture in today’s header. In Russian this phenomenon is called the equivalent of Gala lights, but when searching for that term on Google, I found nothing. Dina discovered that the English denomination is Light pillar, and in contrast to Northern and Southern lights being electric impulses, the Light pillar is more of an optical illusion, similar to a halo or a rainbow, where water drops high up in the sky refract the sun light and create this marvellous sensation. But this can only happen when the sun is very low on the horizon, rising or setting, and in temperature below -20 degrees Celsius. More of this can be found in reference #1 below.

Addendum on 13’2024 (2024-01-13)

Only two days after I published the post above, I learned of another interesting natural phenomeon that only can occur during the winter.

This time it is an earthbound matter. In the vicinity of Gothenburg, Sweden, a woman named Emelie Mellberg decided to take a walk on sunny winters day. When she came to the lake Kåsjön, there was something absolutely marvellous that caught her eyes. On the frozen ice surface were thousands of ice crystals forming flowers, the reason why this phenomenon is called ice roses. It happens when the droplets reach the surface from underneath. Water vapor freezes on the drops and starts to form flowerlike figures. The conditions for this to occur depend on the air temperature and humidity. There is a need for clear sky, a light wind and cold weather. See the following photo and the video clip in reference #2. My warmhearted thanks to my friend Cecilia for appointing this to me!

Ice roses on Kåsjön, Gothenburg. Photo by Emelie Mellberg and published by SvT.

That’s what I learned in school today!

Ref.:

1: Light pillar

2: Ice roses

*: What did you learn in school today?