Auroras, Meteors, and Other Atmospheric Phenomena rainbows, sun dogs, halos, and lunar and solar coronas

Auroras Auroras originate with the sun. Titanic explosions on the sun eject charged particles into space and some hit our planet. The particles cause the air to glow - what we call auroras.

Rainbows Rainbows are caused by rain drops in the air. These rain drops break light down into its many colors. When we see the reflected light, we see sun’s spectrum

Sundogs Sun dogs work much like rainbows, but the spectrum is caused by ice crystals high up. Six-sided ice crystals produce the spectrum and scatter sun’s light.

Halos and Coronas Halos around the sun an moon are nothing more than complete sundogs - or moondogs! Coronas are caused only by light scattering.

Meteors Meteors often arrive from space as meteor showers. Meteors are caused by debris from passing comets. The debris falls to Earth as a hot, shining streak.

Comets Frozen remains from the formation of our solar system. While not normally found in our planet’s atmosphere, comets can crash to earth. One probably did so in northern Russia in the year 1908.