• Question: What causes a rainbow?

    Asked by yooda to Bob, Katie, Nisha, Sallie, Vee on 28 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Sallie Baxendale

      Sallie Baxendale answered on 28 Jun 2012:

      When the sun shines through water droplets in the air, it is bent and split into the colours of the rainbow . White light is actually a mixture of these colours.

    • Photo: Bob Bonwick

      Bob Bonwick answered on 2 Jul 2012:

      Water in the air acts a prism, splitting the sun light into it’s colours in the spectrum (Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo and Violet). Because of our perception, the direction of the light and the location of the water in the air you cannot find the a rainbow’s end, sadly as according to legend there is a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.

    • Photo: Vee Mitchell

      Vee Mitchell answered on 2 Jul 2012:

      When the angle between you, the sun and the rain is just right, the white light from the sun is split into its component coloured lights by the air droplets acting as a prism.

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