CHAUDEFONDS-SUR-LAYON (49) 12.09.2014

In the Chaudefonds-sur-Layon case dated 12 September 2014, a woman driving noticed a light like a second Sun, stopped and got out to photograph it. Two different phenomena were involved (see the annotated photograph). Directly, the witness saw a false Sun with an iridescent edge, typical of a parhelion or sundog 22° from the Sun. Later, the smartphone photographs revealed luminous “cylinders” opposite the Sun. These are typical lens flare, reflections within the lens. The bright spots are symmetrically opposite the Sun about the image center. Their changing positions in the apparent sky therefore depend on how the Sun was framed in each image. The case is classified A: directly observed parhelion and lens flare noticed later in photographs.