Gee, three days with a cloud or two over droughty Catalina! Yay! Here’s yesterday morning’s nice Cirrus uncinus (icy clouds with long trails). Then, later that morning, the RARELY seen Cirrus castellanus sporting some mammatus (downward protuberances at the bottom) showed up. (I should note that some of the female atmos sci students at… Continue reading Sunrise and Cirrus splendor; the rarely seen Cirrus castellanus floats by
Category: Cirrus clouds
This is a new category
“Smoke gets in your skies”
Remember that great Harold Arlyn song about smog? He was pretty upset when he wrote it I would imagine. Btw, the song was covered later in the 1950s by a group called The Platters… Below we have a shot of some late afternoon pretty, undulating Cirrus or Cirrostratus… (NOT!) That was a trick question, actually… Continue reading “Smoke gets in your skies”
Clouds to the north, clouds to the south, but not one in visual range from Cat land
Yesterday around this time I asserted that there would be some Cirrus and maybe some Altocumulus clouds for great sunset/sunrise photos last evening and this morning. In fact, there wasn’t and isn’t as I write, enough humidity at Cirrus levels for even obnoxious contrails! Bad forecast! Here’s what Cirrus clouds looks like, in case you’ve… Continue reading Clouds to the north, clouds to the south, but not one in visual range from Cat land
Sunrise and sunset heaven: Cirrus and maybe Altocumulus on the way
Yep, a cute tiny little upper air low with just a dollop of high clouds is going to be spit out of the eastern Pacific off Baja Cal today and tomorrow and toward AZ, and along with that will come some Cirrus and probably Altocumulus floccus and castellanus clouds, maybe with virga. The first Cirrus… Continue reading Sunrise and sunset heaven: Cirrus and maybe Altocumulus on the way
How Cirrus clouds grow up to be “uncinus” ones
What a glorious day yesterday was, if about 20 degrees F below normal! So much new snow on the Catalinas down to such low elevations for almost mid-April. Some sites in the Catalina Mountains reported over an inch of water content in that snow! Yay! Here in Catalina we had a bountiful 0.69 inches,… Continue reading How Cirrus clouds grow up to be “uncinus” ones
Cirrus uncinus display; the tops of storms made visible
First, some instructional material: You should be looking for your camera now, as seen in the first shot! Those Cirrus clouds to the SW are moving at you rapidly (95 kts, 115 mph at 30-35 Kft ASL!), and so there’s not much time! In this first shot you can already detect some Cirrus uncinus, Cirrus… Continue reading Cirrus uncinus display; the tops of storms made visible
Complications in the sky
First of all, let me assure quesy readers that the jet leaving the contrail at left was not “flaming out” and about to crash as it traversed the sky at this time, as the staccato nature of the contrail at left might suggest. The staccato nature of the contrail is due to vagaries of humidity… Continue reading Complications in the sky
Virga anyone?
Mr. Cloudmaven person foretold certain cloud types would occur yesterday in conjunction with “storm” 3 yesterday (which was really only the passage of an upper level trough over us–see map for 5PM yesterday). Let’s see how he did, that is, whether he is an actual “cloudmaven”: (0=not observed, 1 observed, -1, cloud observed, not predicted:… Continue reading Virga anyone?
Trick and treat sunset yesterday evening
Late yesterday afternoon, the sun appeared to be setting in the wrong location, about 20-25 degrees south of where it is supposed to be at this time of year. Perhaps something horrible had happened, I thought. Retirement with a happy ending here in Arizona was too good to be true, I thought, and now it… Continue reading Trick and treat sunset yesterday evening
Distracted jet pilots or WHAT?
Now here’s something I have NOT seen before, which is pretty hard to have happen after decades of photographing the sky. Here’s what I saw around 1:30 PM yesterday over Catalina. I took three photos starting at 1:27 PM, 1:31 PM and 1:37 PM. Here they are: So, how to explain this odd “stitched”… Continue reading Distracted jet pilots or WHAT?