Come Monsoon and the chances of catching a glimpse of those breathtaking rainbows increase. We all might have heard of the legend that a pot of gold lies at the end of a rainbow. I am pretty sure that is not true. To be able to see a rainbow all you need is raindrops and sunlight. Rainbows occur when rain and the sunlight combine in a specific manner.
If you have been thinking that sunlight has just a few shades including yellow, red and orange, you are highly mistaken. In fact sunlight is a mixture of various colours i.e. the VIBGYOR that the human eye cannot see. When the beam of sunlight falls down upon the earth, the colour of the light is white.
For the formation of a rainbow, each raindrop has a part to play. When the beam of the sunlight hits a raindrop at a particular angle, the different colours present in the sunlight separate. This is further seen in the form of a rainbow. Since the colours do not slow down at the same pace on entering the raindrop, each colour’s angle is different.
To be able to properly observe a rainbow, the person should be facing his/her back towards the sun. Also, it is important for the rain to be falling in some part of the sky. Every drop of rain is lit by the bright white light of the sun, which further results in the production of a spectrum of colours.
Two different people will not be able to see the exact same rainbow at any point of time. This is because every viewer will witness different set of raindrops at a different angle. Also, every colour that you see in a raindrop has been derived from different raindrops.
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