Date: Sat Aug 23 2008 - 07:07:36 EDT
George,
Stimulated by your comments, I went out to study that pink band this morning before sunrise. By the time I remembered my camera, the effect was diminished a bit but still quite visible. I'll try to attach a very small size of two pictures to hopefully avoid clogging any system and still get the picture across:
The first is about 10-15 degrees away from the sunrise. Is that orange-ish sky due to Mie scattering?
The second picture is 180 degrees from sunrise. The bottom band of darkish purplish blue extends from about 90 degrees to 270 degrees. The pink band, which if I understand you correctly is called the Belt of Venus, seems to be a continuum from the orange band of the first picture, but elevated off the horizon from 90 to 270 degrees. Above that belt is a beautiful light turquoise region which doesn't show up well in this picture. And straight overhead is the familiar clear blue sky, punctuated this morning with the last quarter moon, firmly set in the firmament.
I was unable to see anything that could remotely be related to a shadow of the earth. Maybe because of that bit of land in the distance.
So I'm still puzzled about the explanation for the color variation 180 degrees from sunrise. Why is the bottom band dark blue, then a band of pink, and then turquoise?
Randy
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