• Question: Why is the sky blue?

    Asked by birksy to Cathal, Daphne, Darren, Jon, Katherine on 12 Mar 2012. This question was also asked by harryj, birkl011.
    • Photo: Katherine Haxton

      Katherine Haxton answered on 12 Mar 2012:

      The light that comes from the sun, white visible light, is a mixture of lots of different colours – red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. It’s a process called Rayleigh Scattering and means that the blue bits of light get bounced around in all directions by particles and molecules in the atmosphere. The other colours pass through without being scattered like this so we see a blue colour when we look up.

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