Beverly Ulfig captured this rainbow photo at Sands Park on Manistee Lake in Kalkaska, Michigan, on July 23, 2018. She wrote:
The entire day had a feel of rain off and on. It did rain at approximately 5:30 p.m. for about 10 minutes. But it remained somewhat cloudy. The sun appeared about 7 p.m., and then we were treated to this special occurrence.
What Beverly caught is a rare type of rainbow, called a reflection rainbow. You sometimes see one over water, as in the photo above. At the great website Atmospheric Optics, Les Cowley explains:
Sunlight reflected off the water and traveling upwards makes the reflection bow. To raindrops, the reflected light appears to come from a second sun the same angular distance below the water as the real sun is above it.
Deborah Byrd created the EarthSky radio series in 1991 and founded EarthSky.org in 1994. Prior to that, she had worked for the University of Texas McDonald Observatory since 1976, and created and produced their Star Date radio series. Today, she serves as Editor-in-Chief of this website. She has won a galaxy of awards from the broadcasting and science communities, including having an asteroid named 3505 Byrd in her honor. In 2020, she won the Education Prize from the American Astronomical Society, the largest organization of professional astronomers in North America. A science communicator and educator since 1976, Byrd believes in science as a force for good in the world and a vital tool for the 21st century. "Being an EarthSky editor is like hosting a big global party for cool nature-lovers," she says.
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