An eye-popping video of seven suns taken from a hospital in China has captured the attention and baffled viewers around the world.
A woman was recording the sun’s descent over the horizon when something spectacular occurred – the image showed more than one sun in the sky.
However, the minute-long video which seemed like a cosmic miracle was actually an optical illusion created by the glass window through which it was filmed.
The phenomenon was caused by the light refracting through the window’s layered glass.
A woman in China captured an image of what appeared to be seven suns in the sky. The image was caused by refracted light through the paned glass window
The video was captured from the 11th floor of a hospital in Chengdu, China southwest of Sichuan on August 18, showing the sun duplicated with varying levels of intensity.
The woman who reportedly captured the video, known as Wang, said viewers were transfixed by the surreal display, according to Jam Press, as many have offered theories about how the phenomenon occurred.
‘This happened because of a magnetic field glitch that made parallel universes visibly manifest,’ one person wrote on the Chinese social media platform Weibo.
‘The Cosmic Bureau has fixed the issue, and those responsible have been reprimanded,’ they added.
Others argued on Reddit that the fragmented suns were a sign of ‘immense pollution’ in China and another person wrote: ‘The truth about global warming has finally been revealed.
Meanwhile, one person simply joked: ‘Will the real Sun shady please rise up?’ in a nod to rapper Eminem’s famed hit ‘The Real Slim Shady.’
However, one commenter did correctly address the question of how a video showed seven suns, writing: ‘This is caused by the reflection/refraction in glass in a multi-pane window. Light from the sun bounces between layers causing the distinct visual separation of the reflections.’
Similar to how you would see a reflection in a mirror, the light refracted and reflected off the layered glass, with each layer creating another copy of the image.
Except for the brightest sun in the center, which is the real one, the others are part of the optical illusion.
Although there is a scientific explanation for the seven suns, some people still preferred to believe that the spectacle fell under the story of Hou Yi.
In Chinese mythology, Hou Yi was portrayed as the god of archery who was sent from the Heavens to help humans.
He is said to have stopped 10 suns from burning up the earth and according to the tale, shot them down with his magic bows and arrows.
The tenth sun begged for its life and agreed to separate the day from the night as punishment for attempting to burn up the earth.
