Moonbow

For the musician, see White Rainbow.

Photograph of a spray moonbow (lunar rainbow)

A moonbow (also known as a lunar rainbow, white rainbow, lunar bow or space rainbow) is a rainbow produced by light reflected off the surface of the moon rather than from direct sunlight. Moonbows are relatively faint, due to the smaller amount of light reflected from the surface of the moon. They are always in the opposite part of the sky from the moon.

It is difficult for the human eye to discern colors in a moonbow because the light is usually too faint to excite the cone color receptors in human eyes. As a result, they often appear to be white.^[1] However, the colors in a moonbow do appear in long exposure photographs.

True moonbows

A true moonbow is lit from the Moon itself. A colored rainbow when the sun is setting or when it is darker out is not a moonbow because it is still produced by sunlight. Moonbows have been mentioned at least since Aristotle, in his Meteorology, circa 350 BC, and in 1847; ^[2], and the term moonbow was used by Nick Whelan who sighted one of the first documented moonbows in Eastern Utah^{[citation needed]}.

Faux moonbows

A colored circle around the moon is not a moonbow—it is usually a 22° halo produced by refraction through hexagonal ice crystals in cirrus cloud. Colored rings close to the moon are a corona, a diffraction phenomenon produced by very small water droplets or ice crystals in clouds.

Viewing

Moonbows are most easily viewed when the moon is near to full (when it is brightest). For true moonbows, other than those produced by waterfalls or sprays, the moon must be low in the sky (less than 42 degrees and preferably lower) and the sky must be dark. And of course there must be rain falling opposite the moon. This combination of requirements makes moonbows much more rare than rainbows produced by the sun.

Notable spray moonbow locations

Spray moonbow at the Lower Yosemite Fall

Few places in the world frequently feature this phenomenon. Several waterfalls in Yosemite National Park. Cumberland Falls,^[3] near Corbin, Kentucky, U.S.A. and Victoria Falls^[4] on the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe are widely known for moonbow occurrence. Also Waimea on Hawaii's Kauai Island. A moonbow sighting occurred on July 26, 2010 at Kalapana on the island of Hawaii (the Big island), seen from near the active lava flow.^{[citation needed]}

See also

• Rainbow

References

External links

• High resolution images in Wikipedia Commons
• "Maui's Night Sky" Time elapse photography by Wally Pacholka. Maui No Ka 'Oi Magazine Vol.14, No.3 (May 2010)
• Lunar Rainbow photos from Victoria Falls
• Moonbow picture
• Moonbow picture made with long exposure
• Moonbow in New Zealand
• Moonbow predictions - Lower Yosemite Falls - as calculated by Don Olson at Texas State
• Moving rainbow over Patagonia, all night time lapse movie
• Kentucky State Park Moonbow Dates At the bottom of the page
• Moon Light Effects: Moon Rings, Moon Dogs And Other Moon Light Phenomena...