Ice crystals on a still night

The beautiful columns of light in the sky are caused by the way ice crystals reflect and refract lights coming up from the ground. There was no wind at all tonight, so the columns lasted a really long time. See it on black.

More about light pillars.
A more dramatic version in Latvia.
Hard science explanation.

Comments and faves

  1. GaryRich (40 months ago | reply)

    Hey what a great sighting. Two days ago I ran across this post at dailymail.com! I've never seen pics of this event.

    Ice Lights

  2. nicholasjon (40 months ago | reply)

    For all the years I've spent outside looking at the sky, I'd never seen this before either. It was really cool.

  3. amyybeth (40 months ago | reply)

    Yep, it was awesome. Even better in person.

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