24 October 2014
Circumzenithal Arc over Maryland
Posted by Dan Satterfield
The halo near the sun is at 22 degrees, and the bright spot to the left is a sundog (or more technically a Parahelia). Now, Look at the top of the pic, and you see something rather more rare: a CIRCUMZENITHAL ARC. I took the picture (with my newly arrived iPhone 6) just before 5 PM EDT (21 GMT) this Friday evening here in Salisbury,Maryland.
The image below from Les Cowley’s excellent Atmospheric Optics website shows what you are seeing. Les’s website has the real low-down on all kind of optics, and we meteorologists use it frequently to look up some of the more rare optical phenomena!
I saw one and took a pic on the same day, about the same time. Raleigh, NC.