News•August 15, 2014
Picture This: Pileus Cloud and Lots and Lots of Rain
Boy, did it rain a lot this week. Torrential rains fell from Seattle to Long Island, flooding not only highways, houses and parking lots, but also Twitter with images of stranded drivers and their cars covered nearly up to their roofs. But there were plenty of other memorable weather images this week, and we’ve got some of the best for you here — complete with the requisite rainbow, or at least something rainbow-esque.
Pileus Iridescence
That may look like nonsense words, but it’s actually a thing. Pileus clouds, like the one pictured below, are horizontal, lens-shaped clouds that form at the top of various types of cumulus clouds (“pileus” is actually Latin for “skullcap”).
As cumulus towers grow upwards, they can push up a layer of moist air above them. As this moist air shoots upward, it cools to its dew point and the water quickly condenses. When clouds form suddenly like this, their constituent droplets are the same size, which is ideal for causing iridescence as the droplets diffract sunlight.
Pileus clouds can be indicators of severe weather (which has the kind of instability that can cause air to rise rapidly), as was the case with the one in the picture below, snapped over a storm west of Pensacola, Fla.
A pileus cloud at the top of a storm cloud diffracts the sun's light creating an iridescence. The photo was taken on Aug. 11 in Perdido Key, west of Pensacola, Fla.
Credit: Adam Helwig
Takeoff Tornado
Not exactly what you want to see behind your plane when you’re taking off. On Thursday, a strong cold front that swept across England set off unsettled weather, spinning up a funnel cloud near East Midlands airport just as a Ryanair jet was taking off, the Capital Weather Gang reported.
From the photo, which went viral on social media, it is unclear if the funnel actually touched the ground, in which case it would be called a tornado. Tornadoes aren’t nearly as common in the UK as they are in the U.S., but they can and do occur there, as they do anywhere when the right ingredients come together.
Great snap of a Ryanair Plane taking off at East Midlands Airport this week with a Tornado hitting land behind it! pic.twitter.com/Heea2idurn
— Robbie Kane (@robbiekane74) August 15, 2014
Floating Space Needle
On the other side of the country, thick fog descended on Seattle, shrouding the iconic Space Needle and making its top appear to float in the clouds. The fog reduced visibility in the area to less than a quarter mile according to the National Weather Service.
This shot just keeps getting better. The view below however, challenging for drivers. Use the low beams this morning. pic.twitter.com/qYwa6n3Q8M
— Keisha Burns (@KeishaBurnsK5) August 14, 2014
Epic Rains
A storm system worked its way up the northern East Coast on Aug. 12-13, dumping extremely heavy rain in certain localized spots, blowing away some rainfall records.
At Baltimore-Washington International Airport, 6.3 inches of rain fell, a record for Aug. 12, and the second highest total for that station on any day. (The highest total came during a 1933 hurricane.) But the heaviest rains in the area fell in northern Anne Arundel County, which saw a stunning 10.32 inches. Such large amounts of rain over short periods of time are a sure recipe for flash flooding because the ground can’t absorb the water fast enough. Cars at the long-term parking lot at BWI were swamped by the floods, to the sure dismay of their out-of-town owners.
Heavy flooding in south Baltimore during a downpour on Tuesday afternoon.
Credit: Blue Agave Balto/Instagram
As the storms moved north overnight, they brought their torrential rains to Long Island, dumping a staggering 13.26 inches at Islip McArthur Airport by 9:30 a.m. ET on Aug. 13. At one point, 5 inches of rain fell in a single hour. Floating cars were stranded on the local highways by the flash floods that ensued.
Flooding in West Babylon, N.Y., on Wednesday morning.
Credit: Sandy Genova/Facebook
Rains swamped Detroit earlier in the week, when 4.57 inches of rain fell in just a few hours, making Aug. 11 the second wettest day on record in the city, Mashable reported. Every major interstate in the area was impacted by flash flooding, and considerable damage — some $1.2 billion — was done, including to homes and businesses.
'Unprecedented' Flooding Event in Detroit Fits Global Warming Pattern http://t.co/DKpkgJYw7k via @mashable
— YEARS (@YEARSofLIVING) August 14, 2014
Such extreme rains are expected to occur more in a warming world, as the atmosphere can hold more water to fuel rainstorms as it warms.
Supermoon and Perseids
These last shots aren’t exactly weather-related, but hey they’re about things up in the sky, and meteors and meteorology come from the same root word, right? Just go with it.
First, the supermoon illuminated skies on Sunday. A supermoon is just a bigger-than-usual full moon. It looks a bit bigger because it occurs when the moon is at its closest point to the Earth in its orbit. This supermoon follows one in July, and the next one will be on Sept. 9, according to Space.com. The photo below captured the supermoon over Fire Island, NY.
Super Moon Rising Fire Island NY @JimCantore@hoffmanrich@ericfisher@spann@kelbyone@earthskyscience@NatureTTLpic.twitter.com/V97aPGFNk6
— GSBImages (@GSBImagesMBusch) August 11, 2014
The other sky show of the week was the Perseid meteor shower, which peaks every August. The supermoon unfortunately swamped out some of the views, but that wasn’t an issue for the folks aboard the International Space Station. Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev snapped this photo of a meteor burning up in Earth’s atmosphere from the orbital perch on Tuesday.
See that little streak? That's a #Perseids meteor. Shot from space. http://t.co/xVqtorQsk2pic.twitter.com/tWvctEP9qY
— The Weather Network (@weathernetwork) August 12, 2014