The unusually floating 'ghost iceberg' photo attracts attention

Canadian photographer Simone Engels was stunned when he discovered the huge white structure that appeared to be floating abnormally.

Clear winter skies and the promise of a beautiful sunset on a recent day in the first month of the new year led photographer Simone Engels to the park on Vancouver Island.

However, when she brought her lens to the pink landscape of the Pacific coast, she was overwhelmed when she saw the structure shaped like a large iceberg on the horizon, the Guardian reported today. 25/1.

'It's a huge and bright three-dimensional structure,' Engels said. "It looks so real."

Canadian photographer Simone Engels was so overwhelmed with what she saw that she thought it was a strange iceberg. It was in fact an illusion, an amusing light joke.

Engels - who has studied geography before - tries to find an explanation for the phenomenon, including the case of large icebergs drifting down from Alaska, passing through narrow straits and islands smoothly spectacular.

However, if an iceberg was in the area - especially of its size - it would certainly be breaking news in the region, she told herself.

'I've been trying to deduce and can't really come up with an explanation,' she said. 'That structure looks weird and I'm almost convinced it's actually an iceberg,' Engels said.

With no one else around at the time, Engels snapped the image and for nearly half an hour she watched the white form on the horizon before it disappeared from view.

Engels shared the image online in the hope of finding an explanation. The photo initially confused locals - including a friend of Engels who specializes in geomorphology.

The image quickly went viral and Engels later learned that the mysterious iceberg was in fact an illusion.

This photographer actually looked at the Cheam Mountains in British Columbia, almost 200 kilometers away - and beyond the horizon from where Engels is standing.

This illusion also known as 'superior mirage' is created during inversion, when a layer of warm air rests on top of a layer of cold air, bending light rays downward.

Light from the setting Sun is reflected and bent, scoping at the horizon. From a distance, the snow-covered peaks look like a towering iceberg.

Engels had seen mirages in the area before, but never as sharp as the 'strange iceberg' that January evening.

'We're living in a challenging time in the middle of a pandemic and it's really important that people realize that there are natural wonders out there that need to be discovered,' she said of the experience that made her utterly amazed. "You can find natural wonders in your own backyard when you step out there and explore."