22? Halo
Introduction
The photograph on this page of 22? Halo by Mick Garratt as part of the Geograph project.
The Geograph project started in 2005 with the aim of publishing, organising and preserving representative images for every square kilometre of Great Britain, Ireland and the Isle of Man.
There are currently over 7.5m images from over 14,400 individuals and you can help contribute to the project by visiting https://www.geograph.org.uk
22? Halo
Image: © Mick Garratt Taken: 30 May 2015
Morning exercise over and I was mellowing out in the garden after lunch when I noticed this halo around the sun. It’s a sundog I thought remembering something I read somewhere. Why is it I don’t know what I was doing two days ago yet an insignificant fact from twenty years ago pops into mind? Anyway my memory proved wrong as it turned out not to be a sundog but a similar solar phenomena called a “22º Halo”, a rather boring name. 22º Halos are formed by the refraction of sunlight in ice crystals in clouds in the upper atmosphere. The ice crystals are found in cirrus or cirrostratus clouds and are hexagonal in shape. Cirrus and cirrostratus clouds may foretell the approach of a warm front and a deterioration of the weather. Sundogs are formed by the same mechanism but are concentrated areas of light either side of the sun (at 3 and 9 o’clock positions). They are rarer than 22º Halos which are actually quite common but rarely noticed. From my blog https://fhithich.wordpress.com/2015/05/30/22o-halo/
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Image Location
Latitude
54.495691
Longitude
-1.129186