Glen Cove woman snaps picture of rare quadruple rainbow at LIRR station

It’s a very lucky day for Amanda Curtis.

While waiting to catch her 6:30 a.m. train to work, the Glen Cove resident caught a glimpse of a quadruple rainbow hanging over the Glen Cove LIRR station. Curtis took a quick picture to capture the phenomenon and shared the photo on her Twitter account.

“Quadruple #Rainbow at #glencove ny @LIRR station Today will be 4 pots of #gold #lucky #chasetherainbow #aprilshowers” Curtis, 27, said of the photo on her handle @Amanda_Curtis.

Technically, the quadruple rainbow is more like a double-double rainbow, since double rainbows generally come with one in the pair inverted, and the two fainter rainbows in the image are inverted.

Curtis, owner of Williamsburg-based Nineteenth Amendment, an online marketplace for independent designer fashion, initially thought the photo would bring inspiration to the workplace.

“Everyone at the station was looking at the rainbow in one direction, but then I turned the other way and noticed there were four arches,” Curtis said. “I snapped a picture right before hopping on the train.”

But what caused this phenomenon? According to AccuWeather.com, double, triple, and even quadruple rainbows are caused by the refraction of light through water droplets several times in multiple angles, creating a complex pattern of reflected light. In general, rainbows are only visible if the light is refracted at an exact 48-degree angle, making the repeated phenomenon extremely rare.

“I barely even had time to process what I saw,” Curtis said.