Halo, halo, halo – what have we here then?
Some residents across the North Island were seeing a funky – albeit not-so-rare – phenomenon in the skies today.
MetService shared a picture on social media of the sun's 22⁰ circular halo, visible due to a thin veil of high cloud which covered the upper North Island.
According to the forecaster, the atmospheric phenomenon was created by refraction of light through randomly oriented hexagonal prism-shaped ice crystals.
MetService said these ice halos occurred very frequently, even more often than rainbows.
"Light is refracted as it enters through one face of the hexagonal ice crystal, and is refracted once more as it exits through another face," the forecaster said.
Due to the geometry of the ice crystal, rays of light were deflected through angles between 22⁰ and 50⁰, but more rays were deflected at angles of around 22⁰.
This concentrated the light at this angle, creating a circle brighter than the sky around it.
People took to social media to share their own pictures of the halo, including Tauranga resident Tracey Lee who told 1News she had first witnessed the phenomena a few years ago.
SHARE ME