Isn't the Sun [
http://www.seds.org…] round? Yes, but in the above picture, the Earth's atmosphere [
http://www.aspire.c…] makes it appear almost square. Here a layer of air near the Earth was so warm it acted like a giant lens [
http://www.atm.damt…], creating increasingly distorted paths for sunlight to reach the camera. Similarly, on a long flat highway, it may appear that the road in the distance is covered with water. In this case, light from the blue sky [
http://math.ucr.edu…] is being unusually refracted [ http://ww2010.atmos. uiuc.edu/(Gh)/guides /mtr/opt/mch/refr/le ss.rxml ] by warm air just above the dry road. No matter how the Earth's atmosphere [
http://csep10.phys.…] makes the Sun appear, the Sun [
http://www.hawastso…] will always be spherical. This setting Sun was photographed [
http://www.psiaz.co…] over Lake Michigan [
http://www.epa.gov/…] in Muskegon [
http://www.ci.muske…], MI.
Explanation
Isn't the Sun [
http://www.seds.org…] round? Yes, but in the above picture, the Earth's atmosphere [
http://www.aspire.c…] makes it appear almost square. Here a layer of air near the Earth was so warm it acted like a giant lens [
http://www.atm.damt…], creating increasingly distorted paths for sunlight to reach the camera. Similarly, on a long flat highway, it may appear that the road in the distance is covered with water. In this case, light from the blue sky [
http://math.ucr.edu…] is being unusually refracted [ http://ww2010.atmos. uiuc.edu/(Gh)/guides /mtr/opt/mch/refr/le ss.rxml ] by warm air just above the dry road. No matter how the Earth's atmosphere [
http://csep10.phys.…] makes the Sun appear, the Sun [
http://www.hawastso…] will always be spherical. This setting Sun was photographed [
http://www.psiaz.co…] over Lake Michigan [
http://www.epa.gov/…] in Muskegon [
http://www.ci.muske…], MI.
Explanation
