The center of Hurricane Sandy was still off the Georgia coast, but here in Connecticut, upper level cloulds from the northern fringes of this storm produced some unusual atmospheric effects on Saturday, October 27, 2012. The upper image shows a total of five Sun halos or arcs and two Sundogs. Three of the arcs are centered on the Sun. (The most difficult to see is a few degrees above the inner halo, encompassing a section of sky that is slightly birghter than the area outside this halo). Then there are two arcs bending upward, in contact with the inner and outer Sun halos. Finally, the two bright spots to the left and right of the Sun are Sundogs. I have never before seen so many atmospheric effects around the Sun all at once.
It seemed only fitting that when the Moon rose on Saturday night, it too had a brignt halo, as shown in the lower image.
Sun:
A mosaic of two exposures (1/400-second and 1/320-second) at ISO 100 with a
Canon 400D camera at a focal length of 18 mm.
Moon: An exposure of 0.8 seconds at ISO 1600 at a focal length of 18 mm.
October 27, 2012
