The Fire Rainbow: Beautiful and Rare Circumhorizontal Arc

If you are very lucky you may see a fire rainbow once or twice in your life. It sounds almost as if it could be the title of one of a series of children’s books – Harry Potter and the Fire Rainbow has a certain ring to it: but this phenomenon is not fiction. If you are in the right place and at the right time then a fire rainbow is something that you will remember. Image Credit Flickr User Emerging BirderImage Credit Flickr User PhillipCTo name it properly, a fire rainbow is a circumhorizontal arc. It is also known as a circumhorizon arc but whichever you chose, scientists (and aficionados) call it a CHA. It is given its name because it looks as if a rainbow has spontaneously combusted as it made its way across the sky. One might even suspect that some malign fairy or goblin has blown the rainbow up to stop some errant human discovering that elusive pot of gold at its end... Image Credit Flickr User Jeff KubinaImage Credit Flickr User irargerichHowever, the real explanation behind a…