A ring or circle of light around the sun or moon is called a halo by scientists. We get many messages throughout each year from people who’ve just spotted a ring around the sun or moon. The night before Hurricane Sandy made landfall on the U.S. mainland on October 29, 2012, for example, many throughout the U.S. saw a lunar halo. Another rash of lunar halos in the U.S. began to appear shortly before Christmas 2012. Solar and lunar haloes are pretty common, but they’re so mysterious-looking that people often express amazement upon seeing them. They want to know: what causes a halo around the sun or moon?
There’s an old weather saying: ring around the moon means rain soon. There’s truth to this saying, because high cirrus clouds often come before a storm. Notice in these photos that the sky looks fairly clear. After all, you can see the sun or moon. And yet halos are a sign of high thin cirrus clouds drifting 20,000 feet or more above our heads.
These clouds contain millions of tiny ice crystals. The halos you see are caused by both refraction, or splitting of light, and also by reflection, or glints of light from these ice crystals. The crystals have to be oriented and positioned just so with respect to your eye, in order for the halo to appear.
That’s why, like rainbows, halos around the sun – or moon – are personal. Everyone sees their own particular halo, made by their own particular ice crystals, which are different from the ice crystals making the halo of the person standing next to you.
Because moonlight isn’t very bright, lunar halos are mostly colorless, but you might notice more red on the inside and more blue on the outside of the halo. These colors are more noticeable in halos around the sun. If you do see a halo around the moon or sun, notice that the inner edge is sharp, while the outer edge is more diffuse. Also, notice that the sky surrounding the halo is darker than the rest of the sky.
Bottom line: Halos around the sun or moon happen when high, thin cirrus clouds are drifting high above your head. Tiny ice crystals in Earth’s atmosphere cause the halos. They do this by refracting and reflecting the light. Lunar halos are signs that storms are nearby.
http://earthsky.org/space/what-makes...round-the-moon
Look up to the moon
and my mother came to wake me up and told me to go out and look around the moon a unique phenomenon. I did and is amazing. Who has night and clear sky go out and see. Around the moon is a circle like a hole in the sky. Don't search too close to the moon or you won't see it. I couldn't either. Look around the sky but close the moon, is like I hole. Imagine I write from the mobile so that you can also see it... So give it a try :-)
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Originally Posted by Linet
Canada
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