Natural Phenomenon

GREEN FLASH

• What is green flash?

     Green Flash and Green Rays are optical phenomena that occur as soon as the sun sets or before sunrise, when a green dot is visible, usually no more than one or two seconds, above the sun, or it may resemble the green light that shot from sunset position.
     Green Flash is a group of phenomena originating from different causes, and some are more common than others.

• How could that be happen?

     Green flash occurs because of the refraction or bending of sunlight by a prism, the prism referred to here is a prism in the field of optics, namely a prism that can refract and deflect light, like a glass prism that refracts white light into a rainbow.
     In the nature of this prism occurs from a point of water in a certain form whose result is refraction whose color is reversed from the rainbow. when this sunlight starts to pass through the prism, this light moves slower in the lower air layer becahuse the layer of air the prism thickness is thicker than the prism layer in the upper air layer. This results in the curve being deflected more dominantly upward and refraction reversed as in the double rainbow phenomenon, because the sun is yellow or orange when rising and drowning, then refraction in the lower area (red, yellow and orange) is not visible.
     And refraction in the upper area (green, blue, purple) that can be seen because it contrasts with the color of the sun. But because the blue and purple light is fairly dark, it is often not visible. And only light green is easy to see, so this phenomenon is called a green flash.

• Where can we see this phenomenon?

     Green Flash can be observed from a height (even from an airplane). They are usually seen on the horizon that is not obstructed, as in the ocean, but may be seen above the cloud tops and also the mountaintops.