Any reference will tell you the Novaya Zemlya effect is a polar mirage — and it is. But Novaya Zemlya-like effects are not limited to the Arctic. The Novaya Zemlya effect is an atmospheric refraction ...

For the first time in almost 5,000 years of observations, researchers have fully cataloged optical illusions created in the sky as light shines through ice crystals known as atmospheric halos. The ...

Spaceweather.com referred to the sundogs Skillern spotted as "sub-sundogs" due to their position below the Sun. "The key to this atmospheric optics phenomenon is the subsun—a dazzling reflection of ...

With heat, humidity, and often heavy pollution, unusual optical phenomena are not uncommon in parts of Asia. But what was recently observed in China, in Chengdu near Sichuan, was truly extraordinary: ...

WHILE in a rowing-boat on the ocean during a sultry afternoon this summer I observed a very peculiar series of refraction phenomena that seem worth describing. A thunderstorm was brewing in the ...