Rainbows

Rainbows are awesome. Have you ever looked at them right after it rains, or through the water outside? Well, I have and I think that they are interesting.

A rainbow is an arch of light showing the colors of the light spectrum. The colors are seen in order with red on the outside, followed by orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.

Rainbows are caused by drops of water that are falling through the air. They are usually seen in the sky opposite to the sun at the end of a shower. They can also be seen in the spray of waterfalls.

When the sunlight enters a raindrop it is bent by and reflected from the drop. When this happens the light appears as a spectrum of colors. But, the colors can only be seen when the angle of reflection between the sun, the water drop, and the observer's line of version is between 40 degrees and 42 degrees.

The rainbow appears high when the sun is low in the sky, the rainbow is lower, when the sun is higher. When the sun is up higher than 42 degrees above the horizon, a rainbow cannot be seen because the required angle passes over the head of the observer. Do you think that the rainbows in the pictures are pretty and neat? I hope so!
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The Highest Mountain

Mount Everest is one of the tallest mountains in the world. It is part of the Himalayan Mountains. They were formed in the last few million years. After the supercontinent of Laurasia broke up millions of years ago, India moved slowly north towards Asia and then crashed into it. The seabed between the two plates (the earth's crust is divided into large areas of land called plates) was crumbled and pushed up on the northern rim of India to form mountains. These two plates of the earth's crust are still moving, so the Himalayas are being pushed up higher.

The highest mountain on the planet, Mount Everest is growing two inches taller each year. Satellite technology says the mountain is currently 29,107 feet tall. First recognized as the highest peek in 1852, it got its western name ten years later in 1862. Mount Everest was named for Sir George Everest (1790-1866), a British surveyor. Surveyors don't agree on the height of Mount Everest. The British government in the 1800's thought the height was 29,002 feet. In 1954 the Indian government said it's 29,028 feet, but a widely used unofficial figure says it is 29,141 feet!
Mount Everest sits on the border between Nepal and Tibet.
People from the western hemisphere weren't allowed to climb Mount Everest until the early 1920's. The first known climb that made it to the top was made by a New Zealander named Edmund Hillary and a Napalese named Tenzing Norgay. They climbed the mountain in 1953. Since then Everest has been climbed by 400 people. Access is restricted by the Nepalese to prevent too much damage to the environment.
Mount Everest is 97 degrees below freezing, talk about cold!

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