What causes that watery mirage on open road?

Answer 1

Warm air is less dense than cool air, and the variation between the hot air at the surface of the road, and the denser cool air above it creates a gradient in the refractive index of the air. Light from the sky at a shallow angle to the road is refracted (bent) by the index gradient, making it appear as if the sky were reflected by the road's surface. The result looks like a pool of water on the road, since water also reflects the sky.

Answer 2

A mirage is caused when the heat of the sun produces enough energy and the heat reflects back off the open road, resulting a "watery " apperance as the suns rays bounce back off the road.

Answer 3

A mirage is a naturally-occurring optical phenomenon, in which light rays are bent to produce a displaced image of distant objects or the sky. The word comes from the Latin mirari, meaning 'to be astonished'. This is the same root as for mirror. Like a mirror, a mirage shows images of things which are elsewhere. The principal physical cause of a mirage, however, is refraction and not reflection. Cold air is denser than warm air, and has therefore a larger refractive index. As light passes from colder air to warmer air it bends away from the direction of the temperature gradient (the "normal" in the figure at right); when it passes from hotter to colder, it bends towards the direction of the gradient. The diagram on the right shows a light ray coming from the sky toward the hot ground. If the air near the ground is warmer than that higher up, the light ray bends in a concave up trajectory. Once the ray reaches the viewer’s eye, the eye traces it as the line of sight, which is the line tangent to the path the ray takes at the point it reaches the eye. The result is that an inferior image for the above sky appears on the ground. The viewer may incorrectly interpret this sight as water reflecting the sky. In the case where the air near the ground is cooler than that higher up

Answer 4

It's actually a "mirage" and it's caused by the heat waves rising up from the road.

Answer 5

What our eye sees and mind initially interprets as water are actually light rays from the blue sky and clouds above and ahead of us refracted by strong changes in air density near the surface so that they appear to have come from the ground. The mirage forms when light rays pass through a relatively warm layer of air & are bent upward from their path.

Answer 6

Heat. Its called a mirage and occurs when light bends as it travels through the hot air. Astrological observatories deal with this phenomenon when they observe stars through the Earth's atmosphere. A hot atmosphere causes the image to distort and wave around.

Answer 7

The heat. That's why in some old movies, you'll see ppl crawling along the desert, desperate for shade and water and just on the horizon their minds see a pond or an oasis although it's just the heat rising off the sand.

Answer 8

total internal reflection of light,mirage is just an illusion prominent in deserts

Answer 9

heat coming off the road makes a distortian



B.

Answer 10

The heat rising. You can see the same effect when you're grilling food outside.