Friday, May 30, 2008

Unprecedented Part 2

(This is in continuation of Unprecedented )
Plane was climbing higher and higher cutting through the clouds...
Now it got sufficient altitude...

It bent right, to take right turn...
(Bangalore is south of Delhi and when craft took off, it was facing the East..)
That turn..that turn made that evening unforgettable...
made me witness of unprecedented event in my life...
I could clearly see the sun rising from west...
As plane was ascending, sun was rising...
I just thought it is simply a miracle...
I was stunned for long time....
After some time....
sun reached was like steady
in his position...and then it set very slowly...
it was like elongated sun set...very elongated...


Now technical part of it...
It is not a miracle..
As altitude of the craft was increasing...my horizon radius was increasing...
and it was increasing faster than the sun was going west with respect to plane...
So relative to me, the sun was moving east...or u can say I was catching the sun...
Pink Floyd's Time song says:
And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but its sinking

But I can say I caught the sun...
leave fun part of it...

Now once plane reached the stable height from the ground...
my horizon was fixed...and now its radius was not increasing...
so sun started setting.
But why did I observe elongated sun set?
There is also technical reason...Its not that sun set at higher
altitude is prolonged...

As it was winter, daskhinayan of the sun was going on...
so sun was relatively towards south...
The day length increases as we go to south in winter (winter in India)
I was moving towards south, as day length was more, or
we can say at place A, south to place B, will be having sun set time later than the sun set time at place B.
the sun was expected to be in sky at place A even though it had set at B.

Few more such things which might be possible:
If you are flying west, at sufficiently faster speed, you might really feel like sun
has risen from the west for complete journey.
If you are going west, you might experience sun set at east...
and prolonged sun rise is also possible..


Finally the sun set that day...
but it left its traces permanently into my memory...Like a line carved on a stone...
Though technically it is not any surprise...
it was an unprecedented event in my life..and not sure whether I will be able to see this things again?
When I will be able to experience again?

---
Royal Sujit
I Am What I Am

2 comments:

  1. "it was like elongated sun set...very elongated..."
    elongated should be prolonged.
    One of my friend has pointed out this vocab mistake
    Thanks to him.

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  2. I have experienced this phenomenon... always amazed about sunrise and sunset from a plane... but never knew the technical reason for it.. thanks!

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