For those of us who never get tired of clouds, here are the elusive ones.

[alfreda89]

http://www.collthings.co.uk/2008/06/10-very-rare-clouds.html

"Mammatus are pouch-like cloud structures and a rare example of clouds in sinking air."

Back in my teens, I saw this formation over Lake Michigan. There was lightning, and the sky reminded me of the cheaper foil-like old fireplaces with pretend fire -- the kind fireplace stores had as demos? The second picture down is close to what we saw.

I thought it was northern lights until I saw a photo of northern lights. Now...I wanna see northern lights!

http://tinyurl.com/5n3zdu

"A roll cloud is a low, horizontal tube-shaped arcus cloud associated with a thunderstorm gust front, or sometimes a cold front. Roll clouds can also be a sign of possible microburst activity."

I have seen this more than once driving north on US 35 toward Dallas/Ft. Worth. In Texas, so far they have all been dark beneath but with a clear area between them and the thunderstorm clouds coming up behind them.

http://tinyurl.com/57dqva

"A shelf cloud is a low, horizontal wedge-shaped arcus cloud, associated with a thunderstorm gust front (or occasionally with a cold front, even in the absence of thunderstorms).

"Unlike a roll cloud, a shelf cloud is attached to the base of the parent cloud above it (usually a thunderstorm)."

Blue Northers look like that. It used to be late November we'd see it, but we saw at least one early in November last year. It was dark like the first picture, but not black like the one further down the screen.

http://tinyurl.com/62ykvx

So -- I've seen three rare cloud types so far in my life! If these are rare -- is that a good score or a bad score?

Comments

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

I love clouds. :) Love these photos.

We've had mammatus clouds here the past couple of evenings--along with thunderstorms and monsoon weather in general. (We have a true monsoon, same pattern as the one in India.)

I've seen the norther formation, too. Rolls in over the ridge to the north, is blue-black, drops the temp 20-30 degrees and usually brings snow squalls.

Noctilucent clouds are becoming more frequent. I've never seen one--you have to be at really high latitude for that.

[alfreda89.livejournal.com]

I love clouds. :) Love these photos.

Me, too! I'd also like to see the Nacreous Clouds. I'll remember this site -- good inspiration for artwork.

[ebeeman.livejournal.com]

Very cool! Of the rare types, I've only seen mammatus clouds, and once I saw a mushroom cloud, which really startled me... I immediately turned on the news to make sure all was well!

Do you know if there is a specific descriptor for the cloudwall you see in tornado weather?

---Ellen

[alfreda89.livejournal.com]

I grew up in tornado alley -- we were very careful when something really dark was coming our way. Black meant prepare for a tornado -- although I remember once we were in tornado formation in the halls for over an hour -- wind had kicked a lot of freshly plowed earth up and taken it through town. A dirt rain!

The real tornado hints were green in the sky. We definitely hit the basement (which was partially finished, which was nice.) And if it's suddenly too quiet -- like the eye of the hurricane, or if you can hear a train or continuous thunder, chances are it's a tornado.

I was in my first gray-out driving to Dallas in Feb-March -- turned out I was not driving into a fog bank, it was water coming down so heavily I literally could not see the front of the car. So we all slowed to 5 mph -- and when I was out of that one, I stopped under a bridge as far from the road as I could get. The second wall o'water was observed from that post.

I read that a sudden, fast hail storm is also a warning. And debris or a tunnel trying to drop from a cloud are definite hit the basement warnings!