Heat haze is a visual phenomenon that occurs in hot weather where objects in the distance appear blurry, indistinct, or shimmering due to variations in air temperature affecting the path of light.
Essentially, it's what you see when looking across a hot surface, like a road on a summer day, and things seem to waver or distort in the distance. This effect is caused by the bending (refraction) of light as it passes through air of different temperatures.
Here's a breakdown of how it works:
- Temperature Gradients: On hot days, the air near the ground heats up more than the air higher up. This creates layers of air with different temperatures.
- Refraction: Light travels at different speeds through air of different temperatures. Warmer air is less dense, so light travels slightly faster. Cooler air is denser, so light travels slightly slower. This difference in speed causes the light to bend (refract).
- Shimmering Effect: As the light passes through these temperature layers and is refracted in different directions, our eyes perceive a shimmering or wavy effect. Distant objects appear to wobble or become indistinct.
In simpler terms: Imagine looking through a glass of water. The water bends the light, making things look distorted. Heat haze is similar, but instead of water, it's air with different temperatures bending the light.
While usually just an atmospheric phenomenon, in some industrial settings with high heat output, excessive heat haze might indicate inefficient energy usage or potential safety hazards.
