Why do rainbows form after rain?
Show answer & explanation
Answer: Light bends through water drops
Light bends through water drops ✓ — Correct! Rainbows form through refraction and reflection. Sunlight enters water droplets, bends (refracts), reflects off the back, and refracts again exiting. Different wavelengths bend at different angles, separating white light into spectrum colors (red bends least, violet most). You see rainbows opposite the sun!
Sun reflects off puddles — Wrong. Puddles can create reflections, but rainbows form from sunlight refracting through suspended water droplets in the air.
Rain cleans the atmosphere — Wrong. Clean air doesn't create rainbows. They form when sunlight refracts through water droplets, separating into visible spectrum colors.
More Light & Vision questions
- Indigo jeans look blue. Which light is the dye mostly taking away?
- Why are blue-green or white night lights often worse for insects than redder light?
- Moths circling a lamp are not simply aiming at it. What flight reflex gets hijacked?
- Why does glass break light into colors?
- Why do we see darkness when eyes are closed?
- Why do sunsets appear red and orange?