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Old 04-08-2018, 07:34 PM   #3
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Location: Fayetteville, GA, USA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NN5I View Post
This is a striking and beautiful image, but I don't think we're seeing a rainbow produced by an airplane.

The rainbow, if that's what it is, appears to be in the cloud ahead of the airplane.

<snip>

Also, what contrails? I see the aircraft's winglets sticking up, as they do on all 747s, but no contrails.

<snip>

Still, it's a lovely and serendipitous photo, for sure.
I think the wings are creating a vapor cloud (which reflects the rainbow colors) as apposed to a rainbow in the distance because the rainbow appears to stop, very neatly, at the wings, If the rainbow were in the cloud ahead, that would be unlikely. At least some of the distant rainbow would be under the wing.

Each winglet appears to be trailing a thin white ribbon, the one on our right being much larger, that remind me of those silly ribbons you see in the Olympic Gymnastics. (Why do they do that?) Anyway, the "ribbon thingy" is there at the winglet tip. I don't know if the correct name is "contrail" but they seem to be made of water vapor, so i don't know what else to call them.

For the puffy white cloud over engines 3 and 4, I think both the aircraft and the rainbow are both on the other side of the small cloud. The aircraft has just taken off and it and the clouds are both very close to the ground, the rain shower having just ended. I think he has just finished retracting the landing gear.

I did a Google search on "747 rainbow" and this was one of the results. I couldn't find pictures of other aircraft "making rainbows" - only 747s - and there were several. This was the best of the bunch, IMHO. Yeah, it's a neat picture.
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