Rainbows Aloft and Below
All photos taken by and (c) Bruce G. Marcot.
Ever see a rainbow from the sky? From an airplane?
Yes, the circle continues ... below you.
Here are two photos I took of some amazing arcs aloft.
In this first photo, I am flying over the arctic tundra in
northwest Alaska, in Selawik National
Wildlife Refuge, some 49 miles east of the village of Selawik. I am in a
Cessna 206, a small,
single-engine plane, at about a thousand feet above ground level.
Suddenly this rainbow appears opposite the sun and, although it
fades into the tundra below,
it hints of continuing under us and the top of the arc stretches back
over the
tail of the plane.
In this next image, I am flying at about 1500 feet elevation, this time
over the hot savanna and
gallery forests of the central Congo River Basin, in the Democratic Republic of
the Congo.
This rainbow more clearly arcs beside and below us, continuing a nearly complete circle.
Ever see a rainbow that is nearly below the horizon?
Here's one I
photographed in Tierra del Fuego, Argentina -- nearly at the very southernmost
tip of South America.
