About real clouds, weather, cloud seeding and science autobio life stories by WMO consolation prize-winning meteorologist, Art Rangno
Author: Art Rangno
Retiree from a group specializing in airborne measurements of clouds and aerosols at the University of Washington (Cloud and Aerosol Research Group). The projects in which I participated were in many countries; from the Arctic to Brazil, from the Marshall Islands to South Africa.
7:25 AM arrives as usual. Seeming radiating bands of Altostratus stream toward Catalina (little too thick and gray to be “Cirrus”). They also appeared so smooth as to resemble lenticular clouds.1:14 PM. Since its summer again in Arizona in late October, not surprising to see afternoon Cumulus clouds originating in air from the Tropics clustering over our mountains again.1:38 PM. The curved brightening at the bottom of this otherwise normal halo is likely a “lower tangent arc.”1:40 PM. Zooming in with excitement here. Is it really a lower tangent arc? Not positive, but will go with that description anyway.2:59 PM. That Cirrostratus thickened into Altostratus (usually, btw, due to the bottom of the cloud lowering) and at the same time the lower moisture, evidenced by these Cumulus and Stratocumulus clouds, also increased. However, none of these lower clouds got cold enough to produce ice, so likely tops were warmer than -10°C (14°F).
4:32 PM. Mix of Altostratus and Altocumulus clouds, with just remnants of the lower Cu. Here it appears that a liquid layer of Altocumulus now resides at the bottom of the Altostratus, or may be embedded in it. The globular masses in the middle of this photo represent droplet clouds that appear to have merged into a plate. In the distance, the telltale sign of lowering tops: only droplet clouds, with a occasional splash of virga can be seen.
5:23 PM. Just a little before a great sunset, which I missed due to a social engagement, the shallow Altocumulus droplet clouds are plainly evident around the sun’s position. Above to center, the backside of the deeper Altostratus clouds with much higher tops, is about to pass over us. Here you can see, how much lower the Altocumulus cloud fragments are than the Altostratus layer as they are illuminated by the sun (upper center highlighted clouds).
All in all, a pretty pleasant day with interesting clouds passing by, though ultimately disappointing since at one time, this was to be a day with showers here. Oh, well, that’s weather forecasting for you.
Another minimal chance for showers comes up in the middle of next week…
Not as good as a rain day with lightning, but yesterday did have its moments in the sky, enough to make the astrologers on Mt. Lemmon jealous with displays of parhelia (“sun dogs”, or “mock suns”), faint haloes, a rare parhelic circle, something you don’t see but once every year or two, and fallstreifen (fall streaks) from Cirrus uncinus clouds going in almost opposite directions, an extremely rare sight.
The rare “parhelic circle” is a local brightening often extending out from a parhelia (sun dog) at a sharp angle, which I just learned about here1. Usually you don’t see a whole circle, just part of one.
These optic displays are caused by ice crystals, of course, ones not too complex, but rather simple ones like prisms, short solid columns, bullets, and hexagonal plates. Some examples of these can be seen here.
The bottom of yesterday’s moist layer was just above 30,000 feet at a temperature of -35° C and extended all the way up to about 40,000 feet above sea level where the temperature were around -65° C.
The balloon sounding launched around 3:30 PM AST yesterday from the Banner University of Arizona.
Some photos documenting the excitement of yesterday
5:30 PM. Cirrus uncinus crystals heading in two very different directions. Wow. Notice the fibers from the contrail that are starting to fall out are going in the “correct” direction, back toward that west or southwest.3:04 PM. Parhelic circle erupts in mostly Cirrus uncinus clouds.3:06 PM. The astounding sight continues, but fades away just after this.3:33 PM. Local brightening at the position of a sun dog suggests these are tiny ice crystals or possibly even droplets that have just formed, the sizes too small to allow refraction into color normally seen in sun dogs.3:32 PM. A zoomed view of that little bright spot. Sure looks like it may have been droplets. Droplet clouds have been reliably reported to temperatures as low as -44° C. Of course, wouldn’t stay liquid long! I thought this was a pretty exciting shot! Hope you got it, too.
3:42 PM. Amid all the optical excitement was this ghost-like halo. Can you make out the faint circle around the sun? In ascents through thick ice clouds having complicated ice crystals like bullet rosettes down below the tops, as you climb to the top of such clouds, amazing haloes can be seen where the crystals are newly formed and quite simple in structure, allowing the refraction required for a halo. So, this halo was likely at the top of these thicker Cirrus and Altostratus (dense portions) clouds, though no one would penalize you if you just said they were all Cirrus clouds.
3:59 PM. Another spectacular bright spot at the sun dog location (which is also at the 22° halo location, faintly evident here).3:59 PM. Zoomed view of this sun dog/parhelia. Lots of fine structure evident, which is not usually the case with parhelia.4:25 PM. Another finely structured parhelia/sun dog suggesting the ice crystals were newly formed. Fine structure like this can’t last long with the usual turbulence, and so that’s a sure sign this feature has just formed. I don’t recall seeing so many atypical sun dogs in one day!5:09 PM. The normal, amorphous sun dog. No really fine detail can be seen here.
Below, examples of cold Cirrocumulus, ones that quickly transition to Cirrus clouds.
5:19 PM. This group of CIrrocumulus clouds appeared very quickly almost overhead. The tiniest elements are those that have just formed. These are composed of ice crystals in extremely high concentrations, perhaps 10,000 per lilter. Once that ice has formed, its gradually spreads out, much like a puff of smoke would, thinning, some crystals growing large enough to start fall steaks.5:19 PM. Some elements are still forming, but the spreading of the older ones is well underway, producing a “blurred” look as the elements merge and thin out.5:28 PM. Off to the southwest of Catalina, a promising intrusion of lower moisture indicated by these approaching Altocumulus clouds. Will there be enough today for a sprinkle somewhere? Not looking so good now, clouds did not lower much overnight. Well, maybe if it doesn’t sprinkle, maybe we’ll get to see some nice virga and dream about rain…
A horse photo will always enhance a blog about clouds. Expecting a little uptick in readership due to this ploy, maybe will break out of the single digit column.
Not much happened early on, a thin film of Cirrostratus covered much of the sky, delaying the expected development of convection, as would be evidenced by the formation of Cumulus clouds, until mid-afternoon.
But they did form, mostly to the S through W of Catalinaland, upwind of us, and eventually rumbled in on their last legs as weak thunderstorms with gushes of sprinkles and gusty breezes, maybe ones over 15 mph!
Over there in Marana and Avra Valley, those places upstream of us, some spots got more than half an inch. But, i it seems this year that storms die when they move toward Catalina, and especially, toward MY house and its many raingauges (3).
Still, it was nice to feel cool breezes, air chilled by falling rain, even if elsewhere.
Here are a few dull and disappointing cloud shots from yesterday, including one with a horse:
10:56 AM. Horse looks ahead, examining the vellum of Cirrostratus cloud overhead, wondering if it means anything. If this was Seattle, such a layer would thicken and lower into a steady rain within hours 70% of the time. Pretty true for most higher latitude locations in the cooler time of the year. (This was horsey’s first true trail ride, going up and down rocky gullies with loose rocks along side the Sutherland Wash. Previously this horse had spent most of its 14 years in a small corral so this was all pretty new to him; rider tension high.)2:49 PM. A soothing gray of Altocumulus undercut the layer of Cirrostratus. Building Cumulus clouds can be seen toward the Mexican border on the horizon. Pusch Ridge is in the foreground. As you can see, no virga is falling from those Altocumulus clouds, so they must be pretty “warm”, warmer than about -10° to -15° C at cloud top.3:38 PM. Looking suggestive of rain here in Catalina. However, these storms were in the late, dissipating stage. Note too how the anvils have merged with the Cirrostratus layer and lean far out from the storms toward us, helping to cool the ground, ruin the chances of new Cumulus buildups ahead of them.4:19 PM. Not much going on over the Catalinas. Notice how broken up into light and dark patches these otherwise dark looking lower clouds are. Shows there’s no hope for any buildup out of them, though, lower clouds like these under precipitating Altostratus cumulonimbogenitus (that higher cloud here which is really the result of anvils) can help sprinkles get to the ground. That’s because drops or snowflakes falling out of the higher cloud, won’t evaporate while falling though these clouds (representing saturated air with respect to water).4:33 PM. Nice shaft, some cloud-to-ground lightning strokes toward south Tucson, but who cares? Wasn’t moving this way, and would be mostly dissipated by the time it got here anyway.4:57 PM. Some rain with an occasional lightning outrage did reach the southern parts of the Catalinas, eventually making it all the way to Ms. Mt. Sara Lemmon where 0.24 inches was recorded. SPKLS fell in Catalina.5:42 PM. Last gasp, last chance for rain here, dying shower with some new bases to the right, offer another slight hope that the new stuff will develop into showers like this one. It didn’t.
Still have rain chances last few days of Oct into early Nov.
Well, I think so, anyway, and those rain chances seem to carry right into the first week of November. I think you can see that in these graphics from NOAA based on last night’s global data. As in “Where’s Waldo”, can you find the State of Arizona? The US?
Since my risky forecast, and going beyond professional standards of some days ago seems to be working out, I thought I would update you on it. Of course, if it was not working out, you would hear nothing more about it. Below, for October 29th, as rendered by IPS MeteoStar. We seem to be in a bull’s eye for rain amounts. Wouldn’t that be great!?
But, as you know, gotta get through a heat spell first…
Valid at 11 AM AST October 29th. This was the wettest model output I could find, and, it just came in from the 11 PM AST global data ingest! Wow. I’m kind of screaming in that annotation.
Valid at 5 PM AST October 28th. 2016 based on global data from 5 PM AST last evening.
You got yer ridgy flow on the top (“top” meaning, “Canada”, around where that yellow line humps toward the north) and yer broadly cyclonic flow on the bottom (“bottom” meaning, “Baja Cal and Mexico”) that is, across the whole western part of North America. This indicates that we will have a configuration that suggests a “split flow” where part of the jet stream and a trough is forced into the Southwest. Models are showing a big trough and cutoff that brings substantial rains to Arizona!
Of course, model forecasts are pretty dicey at this range, more than 10 days, and so that’s why I am reporting it fully here with great excitement! That’s what we do here, go over the edge, not just up to it.
And, for that slight amount of additional credibility, the “WRF-GFS” has been spitting out big storms for Arizona over the past several runs during this late October period. See Arizona rain below from this rendering from IPS MeteoStar:
Valid at 5 PM October 27th, 2016. The colored regions denote where the model thinks in has rain in the prior 12 h. The rains are foretold to just be arriving at this time, and continue for a couple of days. Nice!
Since I ran out of anything more to say, I will post a second version of this same map as a public service for international readers who are clueless about states in the USA:
Same as above, but for international readers of this blog, and others who may be geographically challenged.
Below, the upper level configuration that goes with the pattern above:
Also valid at 5 PM AST October 27th, 2016. Notice how a lot of the flow comes down this way after extruding into Canada, but some continues on across Canada. Disclosure note: this configuration has more amplitude (and thus a bigger chance for rain in southern Arizona, than was seen in the plot from the NOAA spaghetti factory. Few readers may get this far, so that’s why I am placing some element of doubt here. A announcement that rain might fall in southern Arizona makes people happy, and that’s why I will show those models that predict the most rain here, not ones that skimp on a future rain. Doubt about a future rain disappoints, makes people sad. Oh, yeah, and the latest WRF-GOOFUS model run, that from the 11 PM AST global data, had none of this. What a poop that run was! Does that later run affect the thought of rain late in the month? Nope.
So, there are some questions about the magnitude of this event, will it be a spring wildflower energizer with a major rain, or a just a breezy spell with a dry cold front going by? I’m on the side that a good soaking rain will fall sometime in those last few days of October.
No rain in sight for Catalinans, to get that over with.
However, if you’re bored and are thinking about a quickie storm chasing vacation with the family, monster storms, likely to produce newspaper headlines will be smashing the Pac NW in the next few days. Expect to read about flooding and hurricane to 100 mph winds on the Washington/Oregon coast sometime. Also, Tofino, British Columbia, along the SW coast of Vancouver Island, would be a great place to head for, watching giant waves crash up against the coast and around that lighthouse they have around there, pounding rains…
The long fetch with these storms in the Pacific guarantees some monster waves.
3:49 AM, 14 Oct: Mark “WeatherPal” Albright informed me that a 94 mph wind was observed last evening (the 13th) near Astoria, OR.
The next low, a “regular low” but one energized by leftover moisture from Typhoon Songda, looks to be even stronger than last night’s low. This one comes in moving really rapidly tomorrow evening while deepening (central pressure is dropping further) as it passes over the Washington coast. Looks like that one will be a “blow-down” storm; good-bye timber.
The synoptic pattern (placement of jet streams and lows) is “Freda-esque”, that is, similar to that of October 12, 1962, the infamous Columbus Day storm where a remnant of Typhoon Freda zipped in as a regular low that deepened explosively as it raced up the Pacific NW coast bringing winds of 100-200 mph and blowing down BILLIONS of board feet of timber as well as weather pal, Mark Albright, mentioned above, when he was a kid1.
Well, we sure hope its not THAT similar!
Yesterday’s Clouds
Lots of interesting patterns and complexities in yesterday’s skies. If you didn’t see them, here they are, though its kind of a much ado about nothing, really:
1:23 PM. Icy Cirrocumulus. As a solid band of high and middle clouds approached, the first things we saw as the moisture began to increase aloft were some spectacular patterns in isolated high clouds as the solid band approached. Probably most of the Cirrocumulus we see is composed of droplets, and never glaciates, but here, it appears to be composed of ice, though likely started as droplets at the upwind edge (middle of photo). At the top of the photo, the tiny “granulets” are fibrous, clearly ice, and strands of ice crystals are starting to make their way down.1:23 PM. Got excited and thought you might like a zoomed view of this patch in case you didn’t get one.1:30 PM. I thought this was kind of a strange and fun pattern for you. Look how the youngest cloud elements are over there beyond the Catalinas and the oldest ones with strands of ice crystals falling out are overhead. Besides perspective giving you a sense of radiating lines, one would normally guess that the wind way up there (about 30 kft above the ground) is heading toward you, newest cloud (Cirrocumulus, maybe lenticularis) back there, oldest ones arriving overhead, which would be from the south in this shot. But the wind was from the west-southwest at this level, perpendicular to this scene. Can’t say either of us has seen this before; quite the “Tom Foolery” in a cloud scene, a real knee-slapper. Clouds do that a lot where we think we know what is going on, but, as they say, “upon further review”…..1:32 PM. Confusion? Strands of ice and waves in this cloud that produced lines seem to run in various directions. Some lines are perpendicular to the wind, blowing from the lower right to the upper left side, representing little bumps in the air, ones resembling sea swell rolling in to the shore,1:40 PM. Pretty much unfathomable, too complex to even begin describing in less than a page, which makes it worth photographing. We can make out what CMP deems as some icy Cirrocumulus though, here and there, with that lenticular-looking backside beyond the mountains, though perspective may be bunching it up to look that way. I’ve already taken too many photos in just eight minutes!2:10 PM. Breathing easier now, here, “simple” Cirrus fibratus, lined Cirrus clouds with mostly non-curving fibers,Also 2:10 PM. The scene upwind of that “liney” Cirrus. Also “fibratus” except overhead there looks to be “uncinus” as evidenced by those thick regions (upper right hand corner) likely trailing ice strands back toward the viewer.2:18 PM. Pretty soon the heavier masses of CIrrus (Spissatus) with some gray shading began to appear, with lower, but still very cold and at least momentarily, Altocumulus droplet clouds (above bush on the right) began to appear just below the Cirrus. Clouds almost always lower in time, even when they don’t lead to a storm.2:18 PM. More patterns. Here we have a mush of Altocumulus, very fine granulation of Cirrocumulus (top) and CIrrus clouds passing overhead. You can tell if clouds are at different levels by looking to see if they are moving all at the same rate. Here, if you looked really carefully, the little white tufts of Altocumulus clouds were moving in a slightly different direction than the Cirrus clouds were. How important is this. Not too much.4:18 PM. Skipping ahead, the full boatload of this band, consisting of a thick Altostratus, was passed over at this time. The clearing on the right told you there was going to be a nice sunset in a couple of hours. This was the lowest level the moisture got to. somewhere in the 22-25 kft above the ground, according the the TUS sounding though the darkness of it may make it look lower.6:01 PM. Almost could have been a painting. VIncent Van Gogh himself could not do this scene justice. If you’ve seen his work, like “Starry Night“, you’ll know how bad he was at capturing the sky. But for him to try to capture this scene, it would be beyond “bad”, but rather a total and complete travesty,. The gradual ascent that produced the heavy line of Altostratus is now being broken up by patches of downward moving air, leaving holes and streakiness in the former solid cloud shield. But who cares when you can just sit and take scenes like this in!6:06 PM. The moon amid CIrrus spissatus and other varieties of Cirrus. Notice that the disk of the moon is just a bit blurry, out of focus. That blurring is due to ice crystals in those Cirrus clouds. If it was a thin droplet cloud, the disk would appear crisp and very sharp..
—————————- 1Mark. like most kids who are blown over in a windstorm, wanted to be a meteorologist right after that. Its pretty traumatic and life changing when you’re blown over by wind. CMP’s life was traumatized and changed forever when it snowed a few inches in the San Fernando Valley of southern California when he was six year’s old. Not sure you’ll find this information in the latest Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders #5, however, but its a well-known phenomenon in the weather subculture.
“Too many pictures, for one site…”, a continuing theme here1, to paraphrase “? and the Mysterians1“.
Two stations near Picture Rocks reported 1.25 and 1.35 inches, respectively, so some major rain fell fairly close to us. You can see the amount arounds around the State or here at the Banner U of AZ rainlog,org site.
Below your October 8th, 2016 cloud day, a Saturday in which the author’s former company fubball team, the Washington Huskies, spanked the Nike University of Oregon Duck, 70-21, ending years of futility against the billionaire’s sports teams. Too bad Washington multi-billionaire Gates is more interested in saving the world instead of helping the Huskies get better in sports like Phil Knight does with The Duck there in Duckville, OR….
Oh, well, off task there for a minute. I’m back now!
7:06 AM. Pretty Cirrus uncinus (tufted ice clouds with the larger ice crystals falling out where the wind is not as strong as where the head is) with a few Altocumulus over on the left.8:43 AM. The really sharp-eyed cloud maven junior person would have noticed these little icy trails in a sliver of Altocumulus or Cirrocumulus. These supercooled clouds were converted to ice along the path of the aircraft. The brighter one is the most recent one and is so white due to the extremely high concentrations of tiny (order of 10s of microns) germ-like ice crystals. Concentrations would be something like 10s of thousand per liter. Once formed, they compete for the available moisture, some evaporating, some able to grow larger and fall out just as ice crystals do in Cirrus clouds. The less white trail is older and is one where the crystals are spreading out and also evaporating so the concentrations are much less. Presently it is believe that the air going over the wing of a jet drops the temperature to below -39° C where crystals form spontaneously and can survive and grow within a supercooled water cloud egad this is getting to be a long caption.
Now, here where the excitement begins. Recall Mike L. and Bobby Maddox, both super experts concerning convection, called for severe storms and large hail today due to what the models were showing in the vertical wind profile and the amount of moisture available. Below, we start yesterday chapter of convection, and see where it leads.
3:47 PM. Beginning to think Mike L and Bobby M are going to be wrong. Cumulus in the heat of the day have only reached moderate, “congestus” sizes around here, though Cumulonimbus cloud tops can be seen off in the distance.2:50 PM. Another pretty sky scene with an ineffectual Cumulus congestus there north of Saddlebrooke. Looks like is has a little ice ejecta on the far right, middle. But see how any rain would fall out not within the main cloud body but out the side away from the base. More evaporating of any drops would occur. This is happening due to the moderate southwesterly winds higher up, with slower winds from the south below. Thinking about taking a nap….2:51 PM. On second thought, maybe I should see how the septic repair is going…. Looks OK. Wonder how many thousands it will be?2:58 PM. Even though it looks like Mike and Bob are still going to be wrong, at least someone’s getting some good TSTMS (weather text for “thunderstorms” in case you do that, but don’t do it whilst you’re driving, a public message from your CMP. Some cloud science: On the right is a turret that’s climbed up beyond the level of “glaciation” but still contains tons of water. Center left, is a complex of turrets a little behind that one that are taller, and in those tops you woud find little or no water, just ice crystals. Can you see the difference in texture between the rising turret full of water (though graupel, hail, and small ice crystals are likely inside it)3:58 PM. Septic crew was asking, “where’s the hail you said would happen today?” I corrected them by saying that Mike and Bobby told me that, I didn’t personally make that forecast. I told them, hang on, things are starting to happen. And, about this time, the NWS started to issue severe TSTM alerts for Cochise County due HAIL and high winds! Still, it didn’t yet look that great for us here in Catalina, Oro Valley area. The Cbs shown here are that “tough.”4:27 PM. Still kind of bored, think I’ll take picture of an interesting shadow pattern.4:34 PM. Gads, looks awful out there. Only the anvil is left of a former thunderstorm toward Twin Peaks as the wind shear aloft rips from it from its root base. Not too bad there on the left, though. Still looks like a dud day for us in Catalina anyway at this moment.4:55 PM. Modest Cumulonimbus forms in the lee of the Charouleaiu Gap. Notice here that looking to the NE you can only see the rising turret part of this Cumulonimbus. The anvil is trailing downwind away from you, some of that anvil can be seen at the far right,just above the ridge. But you can clearly see some precip is falling out of this, Code 1 (transparent shaft) likely because as we saw earlier, the precip is not falling through the whole depth of the cloud but is falling from a higher portion of the cloud that has been blown off toward the NE before the precip got going in it.5:01 PM. Yikes, when did this happen? Must have been between commercials during football viewing. You can only go outsie during commercials so you miss some things. Bobby and Mike are going to be correct for our own backyard! Hope we get something, and it appears to be upwind of Catalina!5:06 PM. Just because it was pretty. Cumulus congestus tops, brilliantly white (that higher one in the back).5:31 PM. More commercials allow a quick trip down the road to get this. Of concern, the shafting is shifting rightward and away from us. What’s upwind is now the Code 1 transparent rain. BUT, the base in the middle of the photo, and close by, looks great! Perhaps some stupefying dump will emerge from that and grow more good base material exactly upwind of us!5:58 PM. Another discouraging day of promise gone unfulfilled here in Catalina/Sutherland Heights. Feelling sad, though I would take a funny picture of my shadow whilst walking the dogs at half time, makes me look bigger than I really am. made me smile amid the dismal sprinkle that started to fall, giving us yet another “trace” of rain day.6:06 PM. There goes our complex of rain, thunder and lightning off into the distance. Still, the scene was great.6:08 PM. Day ended with some dramatic, colorful scenes, something said here alot, but true.
The End.
1If you don’t believe ? said something like that, go here
Kind of an abnormal, pithy, succinct blog today. Average WY precip in Catalina, which I meant to add to this chart, is 16.69 inches, so this past WY was a tad above normal.
4:32 PM. Mix of Altostratus and Altocumulus clouds, with just remnants of the lower Cu. Here it appears that a liquid layer of Altocumulus now resides at the bottom of the Altostratus, or may be embedded in it. The globular masses in the middle of this photo represent droplet clouds that appear to have merged into a plate. In the distance, the telltale sign of lowering tops: only droplet clouds, with a occasional splash of virga can be seen.
5:23 PM. Just a little before a great sunset, which I missed due to a social engagement, the shallow Altocumulus droplet clouds are plainly evident around the sun’s position. Above to center, the backside of the deeper Altostratus clouds with much higher tops, is about to pass over us. Here you can see, how much lower the Altocumulus cloud fragments are than the Altostratus layer as they are illuminated by the sun (upper center highlighted clouds).
