This week, sky watchers are reporting an outbreak of rare colorful ‘cloudships’ in the skies above the Arctic Circle.

Strange looking clouds with straight edges and matching angled corners forming rectangles?

Aliens are hiding their spacecraft in colorful clouds these days?

Or if this is weather phenomena what is it called? Let us know in the comments. Weatherman one out.
 

According to Spaceweather, the clouds are polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs). Unlike normal grey-white clouds, which hug Earth’s surface at altitudes of only 5 to 10 km, PSCs float through the stratosphere (25 km) and they are fantastically colorful.

Also known as “nacreous” or “mother of pearl” clouds, the icy structures form in the lower stratosphere when temperatures drop to around minus 85ºC. High-altitude sunlight shining through tiny ice particles ~10µm across produce the characteristic bright iridescent colors by diffraction and interference.
 

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