Friday, 14 June 2013

Nature - Images

Interesting Images:

Rare clouds sighted ahead of Andrea

Tropical Storm Andrea has come and gone. All eyes were on the skies on Saturday as the first named storm of the Atlantic Hurricane season barreled through but did you happen to look up on Friday, the day before the storm? Some people did, and what they saw both scared and impressed them.

Image

A broad band of Undulatus Asperatus clouds covered our skies about 24 hours ahead of Post Tropical storm Andrea. They look scary, but these clouds generally lead or follow a storm rather than become one. The wave affect comes from turbulent differing air masses pushing cloud into shapes like rough waves on the sea

Despite their stormy end-of-the-world-is-nigh appearance, these clouds do not produce rain or a storm. They are most likely to be seen following convective thunderstorm activity. Asperatus clouds are formed by warm and cold air meeting, this causes a turbulant effect.

This surreal looking cloud is a new discovery, the first since 1951. The cloud formation was proposed in 2009 as a separate cloud classification by the founder of the Cloud Appreciation Society. If successful it will be the first cloud formation added since cirrus intortus in 1951 to the International Cloud Atlas of the World Meteorological Organization.

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