I’ve been in touch with Katherine Jack, a British Photographer working on a project in Palawan, since she posted a bizarre yet beautiful sky photo last May on her Facebook page. In the photo, taken at night over San Fernando, Palawan, Jack was able to capture light streaks falling like rain from the sky. And it is a sight to behold.
Here is the photo:
www.facebook.com/KatherineJackPhotography
She had first thought of it as a meteor shower, but since there was no known schedule of a meteor shower that night in Palawan, Jack opted to do more research and contact experts to know for sure. After much research, just this month, I spoke to Katherine again and she has let me know that the lights in the image were finally identified. According to her, this rare atmospherical phenomenon is called light pillars.
As reported by The Huffington Post, Atmospheric Optics define light pillars as follows:
“The pillars are not physically over the lights or anywhere else in space for that matter ~ like all halos they are purely the collected light beams from all the millions of crystals which just happen to be reflecting light towards your eyes or camera.
Artificial light pillars can be much taller than their natural counterparts because rays from the lights are not parallel and plate crystals with small tilts can still reflect them downwards. The crystals producing the pillars are roughly halfway between you and the lights.”
Check out more of Katherine Jack’s amazing work. Follow her on Facebook at fb.com/KatherineJackPhotography and on Instagram at @kcajack.
