10 most beautiful phenomena

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It's pretty clear how this phenomenon got its nickname: It looks like a tornado, but it's made of fire. "It's just like a spinning column of flames," forecaster Michael Watkins told the Los Angeles Times.

They form when wind patterns twist an active fire into a column.

About once a year, the US sees one large fire whirl — as tall as 1000 feet. Fire whirls can spread fires not only directly, but also by scattering burning debris.

hese ice spikes, called penitentes, form in high altitudes, where sunlight turns ice directly into water v***r, rather than melting it to water.

Sun beams v***rize small dimples in the snow's surface. Then, the uneven surface directs sun into the dips and away from the peaks, exacerbating the trend.

Penitentes can grow as tall as 15 feet.

Blood Falls, in one of the driest regions of Antarctica, is fed by an underground lake. It's full of bacteria scientists want to study because they fuel themselves with sulfates, instead of sugars like we do.

The water has so much iron in it that it literally rusts when it meets air, giving the waterfall its trademark color.

As the climate is changing, new phenomena are developing — none quite so explosively as this one.

It turns out that if you heat frozen methane trapped in the Siberian permafrost enough, it turns into a gas, eventually building up so much pressure that the ground explodes. The loud boom and giant hole these bursts create were first reported in 2013.

Formally known as the "Richtat structure," the Eye of the Sahara is in Mauritania. Scientists are still trying to confirm how it was formed, but they think it's the eroded remains of a giant dome of rock. If so, it would have originally formed when magma pushing up towards the surface of the Earth created a bulge, like a pimple.

Each band of the ring is made of a different type of rock that erodes at a different speed. It's also the "almost home" signal for astronauts landing in Florida. In fact, astronauts are mostly responsible for teaching us there's something there in the first place, since the formation is difficult to recognize when you walk over it.

Lake Natron, in Tanzania, can hit 140 degrees Fahrenheit and, thanks to a nearby volcano, alkalinity at the level of pure ammonia.

That means it's almost deserted, except for a particularly hardy fish, the microbes that make it look red, and lesser flamingoes. (The birds actually use the lake as their only breeding ground — not just because they're color coordinated, but because there aren't very many predators around to eat the chicks.)

But animals that do die in the lake end up so coated in baking soda and similar chemicals that they look like they've been turned to stone.

Waterspouts look like liquid tornadoes, but while they can form during storms, they can also develop on calm, open ocean — swirling towers of wind climbing up from the water to the sky.

They are most common in the Florida Keys, although they've also been spotted on the Great Lakes.

Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela sees more lightning strikes than anywhere else on Earth: In fact, there are thunderstorms here 300 days out of the year, according to a recent NASA study.

The area is so stormy because cool mountain breezes and warm, moist air clash over the lake, creating electricity.

In upstate New York, near the Canadian border, there is a small waterfall hiding a big surprise: a shoot of fire about eight inches tall.

Behind the waterfall is a natural gas seep that feeds the flame.

It's sheltered enough by the waterfall to stay lit pretty reliably, although hikers do re-light it if they see it's been blown out. (We should note that it's not 100% natural — but too cool to skip.)

These burning gas seeps are actually fairly common, but this one is more interesting and younger than most — and very photogenic.

Canada's Spotted Lake is famous for its summer style, which is heavy on the polka dots.

That's because the lake's water actually ev***rates every summer. It leaves behind large spots, colorful deposits of a dozen minerals.

Further proof Spotted Lake is out of this world: Scientists are using it as a model for how ancient Martian lakes may have worked.