A man walking on the coast near Falmouth, Cornwall in southwest England got quite a surprise last week when looking out to sea. He saw a large ship that appeared to be hovering in mid-air above the horizon.
BBC News reported that David Morris took a photo of the ship, and was “stunned” by what he saw.
As it turns out, this wasn’t a ghost ship, nor was Morris’ eyes deceiving him, but rather it was a very rare weather phenomenon called a “superior mirage,” the report explained.
What is a “superior mirage”?
BBC meteorologist David Braine said the “superior mirage” is common in the Arctic, but noted that the illusion “can appear ‘very rarely’ in the U.K. during winter,” the report said.
The spectacle reportedly occurs as a result of “special atmospheric conditions that bend light.”
“Superior mirages occur because of the weather condition known as a temperature inversion, where cold air lies close to the sea with warmer air above it,” Braine told BBC. “Since cold air is denser than warm air, it bends light towards the eyes of someone standing on the ground or on the coast, changing how a distant object appears.”
Braine added, “Superior mirages can produce a few different types of images - here a distant ship appears to float high above its actual position, but sometimes an object below the horizon can become visible.”
