Sun Dog Sunrise Morning – Dual Sunrise

Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan

Photographs by Mikel B. Classen

It is a cold winter morning in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. I live just outside Sault Ste. Marie in Chippewa County and I have a view of the area where the St. Mary’s River runs about a mile east. I look out at the sunrise and I see two suns  I grabbed my camera and grabbed a couple of photographs. The ice crystals rising from the river causes a mirror effect creating a second image of the sun. This effect is called a “Sun Dog.”
This picture shows a close-up of the Sun Dog. This is the reflection and not the sun itself. I took a telephoto shot of it just before it faded away and became a rainbow.


As the mirrored sun faded it was replaced by a more typical Sun Dog effect of rainbows on both sides. Look closely at the telephone pole on the right side to see the Sun Dog peeking out from behind the pole. This is an atmospheric effect and not a flare on my lens.

For a more in depth explanation of Sun Dogs, click on this link. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_dogs

Content copyright . Mikel Classen. All rights reserved.