Reflected Lowitz arcs in Finland

On 30th January 2007 I found that local district heating plant was causing a nice diamond dust display. Temperature was -22 C and the steam crystallized immediately. Only a few hundreds meters from the plant was already a plenty of crystals, but the best was about 2 km from the plant.

There I drove to a small road and got out and saw a display like never before. Parhelia were very bright, like fireballs. Also circumzenith arc was bright, but 22 halo was quite weak. Almost full parhelic circle was present with faint 120 parhelia, that looked more like pillars than fuzzy balls.

I had a film camera and eventually run out of film. The only choice was to drive home to get digital camera and fisheye lenses. On returning back the display had lost intensity and the 120 parhelia were completely gone. Anyway, I took about 80 photos with digital and later stacking of those photos revealed faint reflected Lowitz arcs rising up from the parhelia (marked in the photos with arrows). More photos of display is here. The looks of the display is quite similar to the one that was observed by Jari Luomanen a year ago. See photo here.

First odd radius halos observed 31st January 2007

While at work on break I saw some cirrus clouds gather in the sky and I later saw a halo appear so I got my camera out of the car and my sunglasses. As the minutes passed I notice that there were three halos: 9 degree halo 18 degree halo and possible 23 degree halo. The left side of the 9 degree halo looks strange because it is brighter on one side and has a somewhat vertical look to it.

When I later downloaded the pictures I went through them with adobe photoshop and I applied the USM and I noticed possible 20 degree halo and even a 35 degree halo! You can see at least 4 halos in the enhanced photo. The possible 9 degree column arc and 35 degree halo have been pointed out with black arrows.

Combination of high level cloud and diamond dust activity

On the evening of 30th January cirrostratus clouds filled the sky and odd radius halos (9, 20 and 35) were seen in the Moonlight in Hyvinkää, Finland. The 20 and 35 halos were very weak, and couldn't be seen with naked eye. In addition to the high clouds there were good but fast moving diamond dust areas on the ground level. At times the halo display was a combination of cirrostratus and diamond dust halos. In the photo on the left the parhelic circle was caused solely by diamond dust, whereas the other halos were mainly originated in high clouds. A collection of photographs taken by Jukka Ruoskanen is here. 9 degree halo was also seen in Espoo by Timo Kuhmonen, in Helsinki by Marko Riikonen, in Turku by Ismo Luukkonen and in Tampere by Jari Luomanen.

Exciting divergent light halos were photographed as well in Hyvinkää. A more detailed description of the divergent light halos is here.

Moilanen arc display with cell phone camera

Jaakko Tähti photographed this moderate display with Moilanen arc on 12. January 2007 in Viitasaari. "The halo display lasted for about four hours and changed constantly. It was a pity I was working inside. At times however I went to take some pics", says Tähti who used his cell phone camera for photographing. The vague double structure in the upper tangent arc seems to indicate that the display contains also an upper sunvex Parry arc.

The following night diamond dust was drifting also in Tampere and Hyvinkää. See the divergent light halos by Jari Luomanen and Jukka Ruoskanen.

Moon halo over Southern Finland - oriented columns in command

Little after midnight on the night of 5-6th January a fairly bright 22 halo and upper tangent arc appeared in high clouds. At this stage nothing implied that anything better would be on the way. However, at around 1.30 a.m. the halos arising from oriented columns had got much better and upper and lower tangent arcs stretched out to form a circumscribed halo. Infralateral arcs and a 9 halo appeared as well. Judging from the quality of circumscribed halo and infralateral arcs at the maximum phase one might suspect that rays scattered by oriented columns may have partially contributed to the intensity of the 9 halo.

The display ended at around 4 a.m. when low level clouds rolled in. Shortly before that 46 halo and parhelic circle were well formed (although faint). According to the reports so far the display was best seen in Tampere (photos by Jari Luomanen) and in Riihimaki (photos by Jukka Ruoskanen) .

Diamond dust haloes in the German Alps

On 11th of december 2006 I saw a wonderful diamond dust phenomenon in the Wendelstein area in the altitude of ca. 1100m. It was the best in my life! I was a part of it and around me floated ice crystals with different white and coloured arcs. Directly over my head was formed an aura, the upper tangent arc I could touch and on the opposite side of the sun were some white arcs crossed in three-dimensional space.

The origin of ice crystals were definitely natural. The clouds came from the very cold Inn valley and creeped up the mountain sattle. The sun elevation was 18 to 20 degrees.

I've seen with naked eye the following haloes: : 22° halo, upper and lower tangent arc (extremely bright!), complete sun pillar, 46°halo (very faint lower part), complete parhelic circle, anthelion, 120deg parhelia, infra- and supralateral arcs, Wegeners anthelic arc (one of the cross bows), Tricker's and diffuse anthelic arcs, heliac arc, subhelic arcs and Moilanen arc.

More pictures are here.

Diamond dust halos over open sea

It is not so often to see diamond dust halos over the open sea, like here in the photograph of Pasi Snellman, taken on 5 November in Porvoo, Southern Finland. The display occurred only above the sea indicating that the open water was the moisture source for ice crystal growth. A couple of of kilometers upwind from the bridge is a small ski center, and according to Snellman snow making was under way there.

This may have provided the nuclei for the ice crystal formation. Snellman also tells that the air temperature was -7° C and sea +5° C.

On 5 November good diamond dust was seen also in Jämsä and Lahti, the latter of which is not reported here in Haloreports.