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Did you wake up this morning hoping to catch the solar eclipse at 11am?

Though unfortunate that Singapore's weather had other plans for us, some early birds spotted an intriguing sky on Apr. 20.

Apparently, when dawn broke in the thunderstorm above Singapore around 6:30am, it made for a magnificent sight.

For about half an hour, the colour of the sky ranged from pink, orange and purple, before it all turned grey.

Numerous members of the Facebook group "CloudSpotting & SkySpotting Singapore" excitedly shared photos of their view.

According to one user, here's how a photo she took with #nofilter.

At the time of writing, it is raining all over Singapore.

According to the National Environment Agency (NEA), it should be clearing in the late morning.

Why so purple

During sunrise and sunset, the sky usually looks more orange.

This is because of the angle of sunlight. When the sun is low, light travels through more of the atmosphere and scatters more.

Blue and violet, which has shorter wavelengths, scatter first. So the colours that reach our eyes and cameras are shades of yellow, orange and red.

The purple hue seen this morning was a result of a combination of colours, an optical illusion aided by the cloudy conditions.

One explanation is that the reddish wavelengths reflect off the base of clouds during sunrise or sunset.

And when the clouds are dark or the sky behind the clouds is dark, the clouds can appear purple.

While the thick cloud cover this morning dashed the hopes of witnessing the celestial event, it likely contributed to the tremendous hue.

Another purple sky moment

Top images via Andrew Chew