#moon halos

[spagetdomain]

i look at this planet and think why wouldn't people want to save it. and our reasons aren't even all selfish for it. search up nacreous clouds. search up stratosphere photography. search up moon halo. search up noctilucent clouds. this planet is beautiful i want it to be saved for the sake of saving it and everything on it, not just humanity

[thescienceofreality]

So we are in Athens, Greece and up in the sky we can see this gigantic circle around the moon, stretching out as far as Venus. Do you have any idea what it is!? or what it is called? or what causes it to form? I have seen smaller more colourful rings around the moon before but nothing as big or defined as this... :-)

Ah well look at that beauty! Did you take the photo yourself? [It's quite clear and defined, very nice.] Yes I have a great idea of what this is! It's actually a pretty simple explanation; when the light from the moon [and sometimes sun] comes through one of the higher and thinner layers within Earth's atmosphere, which is composed of what are called cirriform clouds, the moon's light is refracted by the ice crystals that make up this layer of our atmosphere. And what it produces, and what you have shown me with this photo, is a text-book example of a moon halo.

[A similar concept would be of water droplets, or rain, in the lower atmosphere that will refract sunlight and cause the appearance of rainbows.] And like a rainbow, these moon-halos can contain multiple bands of colours, and sometimes even produce additional effects [like moon-dogs, etc.] similar to the phenomenon of double-rainbows. 

"Some interesting facts about halos: Halos always occur exactly 22 degrees away from the sun or moon. Occasionally, intense halos can be double halos, just as intense rainbows can be doubled. Intense halos can also produce "moondogs" or "sundogs," very bright regions on the halo evenly spaced at 90 degree intervals around the halo." [x]

If you go to this link here, you can look at the other effects moon light can produce thanks to our atmosphere. 

Thanks so much for asking, as well as submitting this beautiful photo! I hope I helped answer your question, and if you have any other concerns feel free to message me again. And take note that if the halos appear much smaller as you mentioned you've seen previously, and are not as well defined and colourful, it might just be a moon corona. Halos are usually quite large and well defined like the one above. Oh and happy moon viewing! Since this is a common occurrence, keep an eye out for even better halos, moon pillars, and moon-dogs & keep taking great photos!!