• Question: How come there are only 7 colours in the rainbow?

    Asked by Izzyd to Cat?, Elaine, Helena, Iain, Gabriel on 11 Mar 2016.
    • Photo: Olusegun Gabriel Fawole

      Olusegun Gabriel Fawole answered on 11 Mar 2016:

      A lovely scientific question!

      Rainbows are as a result of the diffraction (breaking down/spread out) of sunlight by water droplets in the atmosphere. The seven colours in rainbow actually make up the spectrum of white light (sunlight).

    • Photo: Cat Scott ?

      Cat Scott ? answered on 13 Mar 2016:

      Hi Izzyd!

      It looks like there are only 7 colours, but there are actually lots and lots of overlapping colours so they gradually change from one to the next, giving 7 main colours that you can see.

      Have you ever seen two rainbows at the same time? One above the other? This happens when water droplets reflect sunlight twice. The bigger one will be slightly less bright, and the colours will be the opposite way around to one another!

Comments