Posted on 03/06/2011 1:10:41 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Weeks after a story shot across the Web claiming that the imminent explosion of a nearby star would result in the appearance of a second sun in the sky — a story that was later debunked — two suns were caught on camera yesterday in China. The suns — one fuzzy and orange, the other a crisp yellow orb — appeared side-by-side, one slightly higher than the other.
What's going on? Life's Little Mysteries, a sister site to Space.com, asked Jim Kaler, the University of Illinois astronomer who squelched the excitement over the aforementioned exploding Betelgeuse and who has written books on the day and night sky. The double sun image is an effect of optical refraction, Kaler said, but it's a "pretty darn rare" one, and one not fully explained by science.
"I doubt it's been computer modeled," he said. "There must have been some blob of atmosphere somewhere that caused this truly spectacular phenomenon, which in a sense is a mirage."
Mirages appear when particles in the atmosphere refract, or bend, light. This typically happens near the horizon, where air is thicker, though, and mirages are usually aligned vertically above or below the original source of the light — not beside it, like in the video. It's possible, Kaler said, that an unusually thick patch of atmosphere wandered in front of the sun to create the unusual effect.
Previous sightings of horizontally-aligned double images of the sun and moon are recorded in a book called "Light and Color in the Outdoors" (English edition: Springer 1993) by the famous Flemish astronomer Marcel Minnaert, which remains the most complete reference on double suns. "So many other instances have been reported that there is no longer any doubt about ...
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
It turned out the press was either clueless, lying or both. What a shock.
If Betelgeuse were to go supernova, then it would likely be about as bright as the full moon, which is about one quarter millionth as bright as the sun. And that might happen any time over the next million years.
Dude.
It is Niburu, planet X, the reason for the Earth’s Wobble.
We are all gonna Die.
2012, man.
hehehe!
My sentiments exactly.
Sooo that’s why we have Global Warming!
Oh well, nothing we can do.
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