What's this?

[Tyler Allison]

A friend of mine sent me this pic from his vacation and asked what it was. He didn't like my answer of "hey that's cool...I have no clue".

The picture was taken from Bodden Town, Grand Cayman looking southeast on 7/9 (at 18:57 local time).

If you look closely, there are 2 lines in the sky. The point they converge is directly opposite the setting sun.

Click on the link for bigger picture:

 

[Dan Robinson]

http://www.sundog.clara.co.uk/atoptics/skywide.htm

I've seen this before. It happens when a cloud is in front of the sun, which casts a long shadow across the sky. I have seen them both before and after the sun has set below the horizon.

http://www.sundog.clara.co.uk/atoptics/clshad.htm
http://www.sundog.clara.co.uk/atoptics/anti1.htm

 

[B Ozanne]

My guess is that something is blocking the setting sun. I have no idea what though. A mountain would look the opposite of that. Maybe some high clouds very far away. I'm not sure.

 

[Jim Leonard]

My guess is that something is blocking the setting sun. I have no idea what though. A mountain would look the opposite of that. Maybe some high clouds very far away. I'm not sure.
[/b]

The shadow was probably caused by a thunderstorm on the western horizon a comon sight in western Caribbean in the summer months.

 

[Karen Politte]

(Just got done preparing dinner while waiting for this page to load..... <_< )

Could these be anti-crepuscular rays?

We saw a great display of these on April 2nd 2006 near Wynne, AR at sunset in-between tornadoes. I might look for the images I got of them - but our situation was somewhat different as we had massive CBs in the way! :lol:

KL

 

[Darin Brunin]

I will second that they are anticrepuscular rays. Hollingshead got a good shot of some not too long ago.

 

[B Ozanne]

I will second that they are anticrepuscular rays. Hollingshead got a good shot of some not too long ago.
[/b]

Wouldn't anitcrepuscular rays radiate out from the setting sun? My vote is a big no on the anticrepuscular rays until somebody provides some more proof.

 

[Jason McKittrick]

I will second that they are anticrepuscular rays. Hollingshead got a good shot of some not too long ago.
[/b]

Would anticrepuscular rays, be perhaps the eastern side of a sun glint. From visible satellite images you always see sun glints, wouldn't it stand to reason that under the right conditions i.e. lots of clear skies and very humid conditions and a very distant thunderstorm, that the reflection of the sun might also produce crepuscular rays? Just a thought. :huh:

 

[B Ozanne]

Like I thought, anticrepescular rays radiate out from the sun. No different than regular crepescular rays, just the sun is below the horizon.

http://www.sundog.clara.co.uk/atoptics/anti1.htm

I'm still on the distant cloud shadow theory.

 

[Laura Duchesne]

I got a photo of anti crepuscular rays in southern CO on June 1st.

You will need to scroll about 3/4's of the way down
http://www.laurawx.com/photos2006e.html

The sun was setting behind a TCU and the mountains (next photo following the anti crep rays one).

 

[Darin Brunin]

The picture was taken from Bodden Town, Grand Cayman looking southeast on 7/9[/b]

My guess is that something is blocking the setting sun[/b]

Tyler, did you make an error in your post by saying that the photo was taken to the southeast? If not, there is no way that a storm or object could block the sun and create a shadow when the sun is behind the photographer.

 

[Dan Robinson]

From:
http://www.sundog.clara.co.uk/atoptics/skywide.htm

The rays are all parallel to each other, real columns of sunlit and shadowed air. In the west, perspective effects make them appear to converge towards the sun as they get more distant. They again appear to converge in the east, this time towards the antisolar point. The rays in the antisolar direction, are called anti-crepuscular. This image shows brilliantly that familiar crepuscular rays and the less well known anti-crepuscular rays are really the same objects.
[/b]

The shadows/rays can reach all the way across the sky to the horizon opposite the sun, as the photo at the above link shows. Due to perspective, the shadow gets narrower, just like a road on wide-open flat terrain.

Pretty impressive to look at when it happens.

 

[Terrence Cook]

Definetly anticrepescular rays, if you look at the sky often enough you can see this every day (unless it's overcast). Thunderstorms and anvils create the best or most impressive shadows (crepescular rays) I have seen the dark shadows of the tops of enormous thunderstorms stretching over the entire sky at sunset, storms as far away as 500 miles away can create these shadows. The closer, the more vivid. Moisture, clouds, dust and smoke also enhance.

 

[David Drummond]

Definitely something below the horizon creating shadows as the sun sets behind it. I see it out here on the South Plain a lot when there are mountain storm over west of here in New Mexico. Pretty regular site in the summer time here actually. Sometimes very impressive, other times not so much so.

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

These are anticrepescular rays. Notice how in this case it looks more like sunlight reflected downward(or appears like beams coming upward). In the image posted in this thread it looks more like a shadow from something on the horizon. I don't think the two are the same as one looks like beams going up and the other like a shadow going up. I also don't think what I saw above is all that frequent as I've only seen it a couple times. It was well before sunset in this image as well.

Here is a shadow on an anvil. This is my funnelshadowado.

I bet it is similar to that.