This extraordinary photograph, taken by Elias Chasiotis, captures an unusual sunrise over the Persian Gulf, Qatar: due to a solar eclipse, the Sun appears partially covered by the Moon, creating a shape resembling two “devil's horns” .
To be precise, it was the annular solar eclipse of December 26, 2019 (Saros cycle 132), a phenomenon in which the Moon positions itself between the Earth and the Sun, but is not close enough to completely cover it, leaving a ring of sunlight visible around its edge. Some observers in a narrow strip of land east of Qatar were able to witness a complete annular solar eclipse, in which the Moon appears surrounded by a “ring of fire” from the Sun.
However, in Chasiotis' photo, the eclipse was captured at sunrise, when the Earth's horizon and the position of the Moon helped create this unique shape, different from the full ring typical of an annular eclipse.
This photo highlights a further captivating phenomenon.
Near the top of the Sun, made reddish by the atmosphere, a dark circle can be seen: it is the Moon that partially obscures the Sun during the eclipse. Surprisingly, under this circle there is another dark "peak", also part of the Moon. This effect is due to a rare optical phenomenon: the Earth's atmosphere, in which there was an inversion layer of unusually warm air in the Persian Gulf, acted as a giant refractive lens, creating a second distorted image of the Sun and the Moon. In short a mirage/mirror effect visible in the lower part of the "devil's horns".
The phenomenon, known as the "Etruscan vase effect", occasionally occurs during normal sunrises or sunsets, but in this case it was amplified by the eclipse.
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Further reading and references
Etruscan Vase or Omega Sunsets
Solar eclipse of December 26, 2019
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