Do you see a big ring around the moon?

Question

Look outside...quick! I see a big ring around the moon? Do you? What is it??????

Answer 1

That is known as 'moon dogs' and when it is around the sun they are called 'sun dogs'. They are caused by ice crystals that are high up in the atmosphere. This indicates that bad weather will be moving in to your area in the next few days.

Answer 2

There are many optical phenomena to be seen in the sky. Probably the most familiar and often the most beautiful is the rainbow. Another phenomenon is the ring around the sun or the moon. This can often be spectacular.

The ring is part of a series of phenomena called "haloes". In polar regions, halo displays can be huge and very complicated. At lower latitudes we don't get quite such spectacular displays.

The most frequently seen of all the halo phenomena is the 22° halo. This is the ring around the moon or the sun. They occur more frequently around the sun than the moon but people, generally, do not look at or near the sun so they don't see the halo. You have to block the sun out first. Around the moon, when it is close to full, the ring is dramatic, taking up much of the sky.

All halo phenomena are caused by the light from the sun or the moon being refracted and reflected through ice crystals. Cirrostratus cloud is a thin sheet of high level cloud composed entirely of ice crystals. When there is cirrostratus cloud, you will see haloes. Often you will not see the cloud, it is so thin, but if there is a halo it is an absolute identifier for the cloud.

Ice crystals come in many shapes but the most common has the faces at 60° to each other. This gives a six sided crystal which also produces the familiar six sided snowflake. The light passing through the crystal is refracted (bent) by the ice and emerges such that we see it as the ring around the moon.

Ice crystals do not always have the same shape and the light can pass through from end to end as well as through the sides. These differences give rise to other halo phenomena such as the 46° halo, tangential arcs, circumzenithal arcs, sun pillars and so on. You are unlikely to see any of these at lower latitudes. There is, however, one other halo phenomenon you can see and I have seen it two or three times myself. These are the parhelia or sundogs. They are bright, often highly coloured spots that appear on the halo on either side of the sun. Once seen, you will never forget them.

Answer 3

Did it look like this:?
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap000515.html

It's made by ice crystals very high in the atmosphere (25,000-50,000 ft) in Cirrus clouds. Basically, it means there is a lot of very cold air above you and it will probably get cooler over the next couple of days.

The ring is formed by the 22 degree refraction (not temperature degrees....) that happens in ice crystals that spreads the moonlight around and it bounces off of all of the other crystals.

If you measure the distance from the ring to the Moon with a compass, it will be 22 degrees.

Mack

Answer 4

When you see the moon with a ring around it that normally means there is a lot of condensed and usually frozen water in the atmosphere and it reflects the light and acts as a prism and gives the moon more or less the same thing as the sun gets with a rainbow.

Answer 5

Ice crystals.

OK, that's not enough of an explanation, is it? I mean, the ice crystals are necessarily in our atmosphere, and the moon is well beyond it. But that's all I know about it. There's something about the way the light is refracted off the crystals . . . I should have paid more attention in science class, huh?

Answer 6

"A lunar halo is brought about via the refraction, mirrored photograph, and dispersion of sunshine with the aid of ice debris suspended interior skinny, wispy, intense altitude cirrus or cirrostratus clouds. As easy passes with the aid of those hexagon-shaped ice crystals, it truly is bent at a 22 degree perspective, springing up a halo 22 stages in radius (or 40 4 stages in diameter). A double halo, now and back with spokes, could be seen on uncommon activities whilst easy reflects off water or ice. The prism results of sunshine passing with the aid of those six-sided ice crystals separates the easy into its countless hues, ensuing in a halo tinged with very easy rainbow hues with crimson on the interior and blue on the exterior. The phenomenon of a lunar halo is resembling a rainbow produced via solar and rain falling between your eye and the solar. climate lore says a lunar halo is the precursor of impending unsettled climate, particularly for the period of the wintry climate months. that's in lots of cases proved actual, as cirrus and cirrostratus clouds usually precede rain and typhoon structures. Lunar halos are, in certainty, easily extremely uncomplicated. So watch the evening sky – and shop the umbrella reachable."

Answer 7

Its frozen moisture in the Earths atmosphere! It deflects the moonlight.

Answer 8

It is called a 'Moon Halo' check out this link. http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap061109.html

Answer 9

ITS probably the planet saturn.. the one w/ the ring arnd it... it can be visible occasionally