Tag Archives: Clouds

Mother of pearl skies

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Mother Nature put on quite the breakfast time display for us, with rainbow clouds the highlight

These are apparently Nacreous clouds and only form in the coldest of conditions and high (12-19 miles) up in the sky. Extremely rare outside of polar regions and usually seen a couple of hours either side of sunset or sunrise and, being so high, they are still lit by sunlight which makes them appear even brighter in our evening sky.

Formed in air that is around minus 80C, sunlight reflecting off tiny ice crystals in the cloud give it the pearly colours -the reason why they are also called mother-of-pearl.

And very pretty it was too. Thanks to the BBC for the information, read more HERE.