Later I noticed that the afternoon sounding from TUS had ZERO CAPE, a measure of how unstable the atmosphere is. With zero CAPE (no instability indicated), you don’t expect a Cb. Hence the title, a sciency humor.
With yesterday’s capped clouds, capped by a horrific inversion at 16,000 feet above sea level, you may have spotted this remarkable sight late yesterday; first the wide angle view, then the zoomed view:
6:08 PM. Can you find the little rogue Cb? Has a transparent rain shaft below. I was stunned to see it!
6:08 PM. Zoomed view. Now you can just barely make out the little rain shaft, and the ice-ed out tops sticking up above the Stratocumulus clouds. Just amazing! How did this happen? Don’t know, unless it was REALLY hot over there.
The 5 PM AST Tucson sounding for yesterday from the University of Wyoming Cowboys, located in Laramie, Wyoming, the happiest state in the whole US. Really, there is hardly a jollier people than those in Wyoming!1 According to our analysis software, there is no instabiity indicated that would support a Cumulonimbus cloud protruding to 25 or 30 Kft as the one in the photos above is doing. But, oops, there it is!
Still, even with mashed clouds, yesterday was often a very pretty one, in the 99 F heat here in SH, and ended with a great sunset. See below:
3:31 PM. One of the greatest examples of Cumulus humilis (“humble”) you’ll ever see. They’re screaming at you; “my head hurts; there’s an inversion on it!”
6:32 PM. “All’s well that ends well”–Bill Gates. Yesterday’s heating and strong inversion kept the Cu hum forming and filling in so that they accumulated at the base of the inversion, eventually leading to almost overcast skies in the late afternoon and evening. And with clear skies farther west, resulted in this beauty as the sun sank below the horizon.
The weather ahead…
Seems like were destined to be on the edge of the summer rains for another week or so, meaning we might have to get telescopes out to see a big fat Cumulonimbus clouds. Canadian model from last night had some rain moving into southern AZ on the 23rd ahead of a big trough. We’ll see.
I also saw, in the “Moonlight Feels Right moonlight this morning (the singer of that song keeps laughing; must be from Wyoming….)”, some Altocu around. So, at least another scenic day, it a dry one today.
—————————-
1OBJECTIVE HAPPINESS BY STATE. I’ve posted this before, but I felt it was good to remind my reader where the jolliest people are in case he/she’s thinking of a vacation and want to go to a happy place, not a grumpy ones like those in New York State.
