EarthSky Community Photos

Submit your photo here. Comment or upvote on photo pages. Search via photographers' names. More improvements coming! To help, please donate.

Peter Lowenstein
Mutare, Zimbabwe
01/27/2024
06:46 pm

Equipment Details:

Tripod-mounted Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS40 in sunset mode.

Post-processing Details:

Compilation of montage from four best pictures.

Image Details:

Volcanic Sunset with Crepuscular Rays 6.46-6.54 pm.
Bright volcanic sunsets have been absent for over a month since the last one on Christmas Eve giving the impression that the volcanic aerosols from the 15 January 2022 eruption of the Hunga Tonga volcano may, after two years, have disappeared from the stratosphere. However, on the 26th and 27th of this month they suddenly returned to make a dramatic re-appearance as shown in the accompanying beautiful display photographed on Saturday evening which developed twenty minutes after sunset and faded half-an-hour later. This shows that there must still be sufficiently dense patches to produce strong optical effects.