(SOUTHERN COLORADO) — There’s plenty of reasons why we’re called “Colorful Colorado” around these parts, and sunsets just might be one of the clearest examples.

The mountains provide a variety of angles and elevations for the sunlight to play off of as it passes closer and closer to the horizon. This is one of the main reasons that colors can get so vibrant and varied around here.

As the sun sets (and rises), sunlight has a further distance to travel through our atmosphere. This leads to longer wavelengths, like red and yellow, becoming more pronounced. Blue wavelengths, which we see in the daytime sky, are shorter and scatter more easily in all directions.

We sometimes refer to these effects as Rayleigh Scattering.

Sunday night proved that once again with a particularly vibrant sunset visible across the region. A small disturbance, or wave of energy, brought about some mildly unsettled weather to Southern Colorado.

A layer of clouds and icy surfaces helped produce some pretty unique views. Here are several photos from Colorado Springs and the surrounding region.

This photo (below) was sent in by Tami G, who live in the Black Forest area.

This photo (below) was sent in from Danika Larsen of GMF.

If you have any of your own vibrant sunset photos from Sunday, be sure to send them in to the FOX21 Storm Team or the news room!