23°-Ring (EE34)

The 23° ring is a faintly colored ring of light with a reddish inner edge and a radius of 23° around the sun. It usually appears together with other halos created by pyramidal crystals. Since it is very close to the 22° ring as well as the 24° ring, it is often only recognizable by the unusual width of the 22° ring and/or the double color sequence of the spectral colors or at least the red portion. It is also called Barkow's halo. Pyramidal crystals with a vertical main axis also produce the 23° Parry arcs.

The 23° ring arises from randomly oriented pyramidal crystals. The light passes through a basal face and a pyramidal face at the other end of the crystal, which enclose an angle of 62°. This requires truncated pyramids. The graphic above shows the light path.