We have centuries studying the different types of clouds. What tells us the shape and color of these atmospheric phenomena

The atmosphere of the earth hides about 12.9 billion liters of watermore or less. And a good part of that water is in huge clouds that we see fly over our heads as if nothing. These huge atmospheric objects captivate our imagination in childhood, but we often stop thinking about them during our day.

Knowing them can help us pay attention to them.

What is a cloud

The clouds are essentially water, a lot of water. Steam -shaped water, small drops and Even small ice crystals that remain in suspension in the atmosphere. This water becomes visible when condensed, generating a contrast with the blue of the sky.

The clouds circulate in the atmosphere dragged through the differences in pressure and the wind that they generate. They also move as a result of the land rotation itself, since the solid surface of the earth does not rotate in the same way as the atmosphere.

The clouds can be of very different types that we classify according to certain conditions, such as the height to which they occur. For example, when the clouds are formed at surface height, we do not even usually refer to them as such, but as a fog. But the fog is still a type of cloud.

How a cloud is formed

The atmosphere keeps water vapor, small H2O molecules that are mixed with the other gases that make up the atmosphere. The amount of water that the atmosphere can store in the form of gas depends on factors such as temperature and pressure. There is a threshold from which the atmosphere Water “sat”and that is when this water can begin to accumulate.

This accumulation is good when the amount of water increases or because atmospheric conditions make the threshold reduce, and implies that the molecules go from being a gas in suspension to form microscopic water drops. When these drops, still in suspension, accumulate, the clouds are formed.

Types of clouds and characteristics

The clouds are usually classified according to two fundamental characteristics: Your altitude in the atmosphere and its appearance. According to its altitude, three types of clouds are distinguished (with an additional case), groups that the State Meteorology Agency (Aemet) call of “high floor” (the highest altitude), of “middle floor” (intermediate altitude) and those of low floor (those of minor antura), to which we must add the clouds of vertical development. There are different terms with which referring to these clouds, for example we can speak sympleously of high, medium and low clouds.

High floor clouds

The high -floor clouds are those that are at heights between 5 and 13 kilometers on the ground, and include cirro, circoum and cirrostrates.

Cirrus: According to Explain Aemetcirrus are clouds of the high floor, separate and “in the form of white and delicate filaments, or banks or narrow, white or almost white bands.”

CIRCOUM: It is a thin layer of clouds, white and shadowless, “very small elements” in the form of grains or undulations.

CIRROSTRATE: These clouds for their part acquire the appearance of a “cloudy veil”, also transparent and rather white, only that this type of clouds covers the sky, totally or partially, producing “halos.”

Medium floor clouds

The clouds of the middle floor are located at heights between two and seven kilometers, and can also be of various types: altocumulos, high, and nimbostratos.

Altocúmulos: The altocumulus are already located at medium heights. It is a bank or cloud layer that can be white or gray. Its structure can varybeing formed by “tiles”, “rounded masses” or “rollers”, structures that, in turn, can be “partially fibrous or diffuse,” Explain Aemet.

Altostrates: This layer of clouds usually has gray or bluish colors, it can also have a fibrous appearance, it is characterized by totally or partially covering the sky allowing to distinguish vaguely, but unlike cirrostrates, it does not produce halos.

Nimbostrates: These clouds form an already dark gray layer, with “appearance veiled by rainfall or snow precipitation”, rainfall that usually falls from it more or less continuously.

Low floor clouds

The low floor clouds are those located at heights of up to two kilometers and can be of two types: strata and strata.

Stratocumulous: Again clouds that can acquire a gray color, or, on other occasions, whitish with dark parts.

Strata: Generally gray clouds, uniform base (relatively), which can produce drizzle. The halos in this cloud only occur when very low temperatures are reached.

Vertical Development Clouds

Finally, vertical development clouds can also be of two types: clusters and cumulonimbos.

Clusters: These are clouds that arise in isolation, dense and well -defined contours. These clouds develop vertically with the form of “protuberances”, “domes” or “towers.”

Cumulonimbos: Finally, the cumulonimbos are clouds that Aemet describes as “Amazacotadas and Dense”, of vertical development “in the form of a mountain or huge towers.” On his cusp, a top “smooth, fibrous or striated.”

How much water is there in a cloud?

The clouds are ethereal objects, “cotton” and with a density low enough to keep afloat at a certain height in the atmosphere. However, they are also huge, so the amount of water they can house is enormous.

A few years ago, a group of researchers proposed answer the question How much water is in a cloud. The truth is that the answer can vary greatly since the volume of these atmospheric phenomena can be the most diverse. However, the team made an estimate based on a 0.5 grams of water per cubic meter of cloud.

The team took as reference an average cluster, an cloud that would have a cubic shape and a kilometer long. The result: this imaginary cloud would contain about 500 tons of water. Larger clouds, of course, would be able to house an even greater amount of water.

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