The sky turned green: an eerie natural phenomenon was recorded in the United States. Photos and video

A terrible natural phenomenon was recorded in the United States. The sky in South Dakota has turned an ominous shade of green. It became this way when severe storms approached Sioux Falls on the evening of Tuesday, July 5. In some areas, wind speeds reached 61 km per hour.

According to Fox Weather, the National Weather Service (NWS) said the weather was part of a derecho, a series of connected storms with wind speeds of 36 km per hour. Footage of the storm clouds was posted online (scroll to the bottom of the page to watch the video).

According to NWS meteorologist Corey Martin, the visual effect was caused by the red light of the sunset reacting with blue water droplets inside the storm clouds.

"Thunderstorms usually occur in the late afternoon, when the sky turns a slight reddish tint and the sun's angle slowly begins to approach the horizon. Particles in thunderstorm clouds of significant depth and water content will mostly scatter blue light. When the red light scattered by the atmosphere illuminates the blue water/ice droplets in the cloud, they glow green," the expert said.

Meteorologists also say that to achieve this color, a huge amount of water is needed in the cloud, which means that there is a significant amount of hail. Precipitation did fall in some regions. The hail was the size of a tennis ball.

In addition, according to PowerOutage.US, more than 28,000 South Dakotans were left without power due to the storm.

Locals were shocked by what they saw.

"Never seen anything like it," "Green sky with a mix of blue in Sioux Falls, South Dakota," "Sioux Falls sky color is unreal," "Crazy green with a derecho wind bag moving through Sioux Falls earlier," Twitter users wrote.

As OBOZREVATEL previously reported, last year, on the Sea of Azov in Kyrylivka, locals recorded a rare natural phenomenon, the so-called "coastal cappuccino". It got its name because of the sea foam that looks like a coffee drink.

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