RAINBOW LIGHT PILLARS AT SUNSET
RAINBOW LIGHT PILLARS AT SUNSETA quiet horizon, and then the light rises in clean, vertical bands—like color standing up from the edge of day.
What you’re seeing is a sun pillar / light pillars effect, sometimes with a hint of iridescence. Near sunrise or sunset, sunlight hits flat, plate-shaped ice crystals drifting in cold air or thin high clouds. Those crystals act like tiny mirrors, sending the light back toward you and stacking it into tall columns. The soft rainbow tones can happen when the light is also being slightly split and scattered by very small droplets or ice particles, adding that pastel spectrum.
A small detail that makes scenes like this feel unreal: the pillars don’t “shoot” upward—your eyes are catching millions of aligned reflections at once, and the columns fade as soon as the crystals tilt or the wind shifts.
Where you can see that:
Look for it in cold weather with thin high cloud (or icy haze), right around sunrise or sunset, especially in mountain valleys, open plains, or lakeside viewpoints where the horizon is clear.
Best regions for it:
Northern U.S./Canada, Alaska, Scandinavia, Iceland, and high-elevation areas in winter—anywhere you get cold air + ice crystals + a low sun.
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