PALM BEACH COUNTY, Fla. — A beautiful and relatively rare sight was captured Wednesday evening over Palm Beach County as a rainbow cloud formed.
What is it and how does it form?
Cloud iridescence is also called a rainbow cloud or a fire rainbow. It can happen when small water droplets or small ice crystals in a cloud scatter the sun's light.
It happens in relatively thin or semi-transparent clouds that light is bent through.
In this case, moist air above a towering cumulonimbus cloud, cooled and condensed to form a pileus cloud — a type of growing cloud that appears as a cap or scarf above a cloud. It is known for creating iridescent clouds, which are more commonly seen in the tropics and subtropics.
While rainbow clouds are similar to rainbows with light interacting with cloud droplets, the color pattern does not bow in a Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet fashion. Instead, the light is scattered in a pastel and more disorderly way.
These iridescent pileus clouds only last a few minutes, so if you do get a glimpse, it is a real treat!
