Sunset Contrails

December 18, 2003

Sunsetcontrailsoveroldrag

Provided and copyright by: Martin Henze
Summary authors & editors: Martin Henze

Sunsets over Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains are often spectacular, but these brilliantly lit, moisture fattened contrails really got my attention. The shadows they cast on the clouds in the background give a sensation of depth rarely evident in a sunset. To the lower right, Old Rag Mountain, a rugged, geologically interesting outlier of the main Blue Ridge, seems to cast a shadow of its own on the clouds behind it. Contrails are a phenomenon the Wright Brothers likely never envisioned when their "flyer" lifted off the ground 100 years ago.

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