hello and welcome to my world here in K C. R. A. Studio A. And we're looking at
what's going on currently with the weather right now. So we're gonna start,
is what's going on outside right now. You can look behind me and you can see
we've got a lot of blue skies, but there's also a few clouds out there.
Let's go ahead. Take a look at what's going on with our weather wall here,
and this gives us the broad view of what's going on here in our town, in
the world, in the Northern Hemisphere at least, and you can see where we do
have some areas of clouds over California. But we also have some other
areas of clouds, and what we do now is we kind of take a look and see where we
can kind of interpret what the clouds are telling us, because this is
important. And this is what I look at when I first come in. In the mornings
when I'm forecasting, or in the afternoons, I want to look at the
satellite picture because this tells a story is the clouds circulate around.
They could tell me where we have areas of high pressure and where we have
areas of low pressure. So let's look at this again. We're looking at how clouds
are moving and how they're rotating. When they're they're spinning clockwise
or counterclockwise, so we can see here this cloud cover, it's moving around.
It's pretty easy to see, and you can see that it's rotating around in a
counter clockwise manner. That tells me that there's an area of low pressure
there, but the others is kind of hard to see. So what we're gonna do is we're
gonna trade changes over to another picture from a satellite that's called
water vapor imagery. So what is taking pictures of is actually the water vapor
You can't see water vapor, but with a special lens, especially one that's on
a satellite that's been made for it. You can actually see water vapor in the
air, and that tells me where you can see areas of low pressure and high
pressure a little bit better. It stands out a little bit better. So here's that
at first area of low pressure that we saw and then you could see out here off
the coast of California. There's another area of low pressure, and we
have another one that's actually developing over here and over the great
through the Rockies and moving out over places like Utah, Colorado and even
northern New Mexico are feeling the effects of that. And so you can see
where we have that area of low pressure, the one off the coast of California and
an area of low pressure out here in the Eastern Pacific. But there's also an
area of high pressure. It's kind of snuck in. You could see those clouds
and these air rotating clockwise, and so this is an area of high pressure,
and we think of high pressure. We think, usually of clearing skies, the heiress
sinking, warming temperatures, usually areas of low pressure. This is where we
have the air is rising, so the temperatures are cooling and we have
condensation and the chance for a little bit of rain and even some snow.
That's what they're getting over the Rockies right now is a little bit of
snow, so that's actually what we're gonna talk about today. We'll be
talking about clouds so you can see over Northern California. We have some
clouds that have been moving across our skies, but they're actually kind of on
the decrease right now. So let's go ahead and take a look at our time lapse.
This is over the past, I'd say about an hour and 1/2 to 2 hours. We've seen
these clouds kind of brushing across our skies, and you can see most of them
are some high clouds. Appear somethin clouds, so you can actually see some
sunlight through them if the son is currently under over those clouds. And
so that's what's going on in our skies rate now. So let's talk a little bit
more about clouds and what creates clouds and how clouds are created. Even
take a look at the different types of clouds. At least some of the varieties
of clouds that are in our skies and maybe you could become, which called a
nephrologist pathologist, is somebody who studies clouds. So we need to come
over here into our weather wall, hop on our weather bubble, hurry here and talk
about how clouds air created.
So first off, we're taking temperature because temperature is important in the
formation of clouds. Here, I'm sitting on the surface of the earth, and it's
about 60 degrees outside right now at the surface. Last lesson. We talked
about what happens when we go up in the air. When we start to go higher in
elevation, Well, something changes. Will the pressure changes and also the
temperature changes. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna take a little
ride up, and we're gonna start out also by talking about something called Do
Pointe du Point is the temperature at which condensation occurs in the air
again. The air has lots of water, and it's called water vapor. You can't see
the water vapor, but when temperatures drop down to what's called dew point
here 23 degrees, it's fairly dry outside right now. Um, when those
temperatures reach 23 degrees, as when we start to see condensation occurs. So
as we rise in temperature Or I should say, when we rise in elevation and we
drop in temperature, um, you can see some changes happen here. Temperature
drops and gets closer to do point. But here, at 5000 feet, it's still not cold
enough for condensation to occur. Temperature 41 degrees, still well
above the 23 degrees of Dew Point. So if we rise a little bit more, elevate
ourselves a little higher, we get up to about 10,000 feet, and that's where the
temperature starts to match. Rate up there with dew point and when we get
that condensation can occur, doesn't mean it's going to occur. But it means
that it can occur. One of the important ingredients that you need to have is
not only water vapor, but you have to have something for that water vapor to
stick to. You need to have what's called a well, a hydra Skopje particle,
something that that water can stick to. Also, they're called hydro filic
particles. That's because it attracts water as opposed to hydrophobic, which
is scared of water. So you have the little particles, and that could be
little pieces of salt. It could be dust. It could be smoke. It could be just
anything any little object that's floating around that the currents
American. Keep it up so where we can get some condensation. So once that
temperature has met and we have our little particles that are in the sky,
look what happens. We start to see some clouds developed so the clouds start to
form and these clouds, because they're very, very high. These air actually
made out of ice crystals and those little ice crystals. Well, you can have
more water vapor attached to them, and you get more clouds. And, depending on
how much water vapor is available, depends on how much cloud cover you can
have. So if there's a lot of water vapor in the higher elevations, you
could get a lot of clouds out there. Now to drop back down to the surface,
you'll notice once again the dew point here. Not here, but here is 23 degrees
clouds there, up high, they're not down. Low surface temperature is 60 degrees,
so we don't have that combination of temperature and dew point at the same
temperature. Therefore, we don't have the clout, so we need to have that
combination of the two of them. So let's go ahead now and take a look at
how we can make clouds here at the surface.
Let's take a peek. What do we have to change? Well, we have to change the
temperature, so we have our water vapor put this year, we're gonna go into our
little science table table of science. And, um, what I want to do is I'm gonna
put on my safety glasses because we're gonna be working with some very, very
cold stuff, and you never know what's gonna splatter around. I also have a
glove here because what I have in here is what's called dry ice
and dry ice is not normalize. Dry ice is actually
urban dioxide,
and carbon dioxide is very, very cold when it's in its solid form. In fact,
it has to be over 100 and nine degrees below zero for that to form into a
solid. That's what we have in here.
Which one right there so you can see that's the dry ice is so white it looks
like ice starting to vibrate a little bit. But what we need to do is you
don't see any clouds here, but the air is getting colder inside this pot. But
what I need to do is I'm going thio amp up the amount of water vapor that there
is available for this to form a cloud. So we got the cooler air. In fact, I
could feel the cold. It's pot is getting cold. The air in the pot is
getting cold. I'm gonna pour in some water
and you may notice
something starts to form.
Oh, my, look at that. It's starting to spill out over the top.
Kind of looks like a witches brew.
There we go. So what's happening here is this is actually a cloud that's
forming, and what we've done is we've taken that cold environment with carbon
dioxide very, very cold. We've added the water vapor to it, and we put the
water in there. It actually means little bubbles of of carbon dioxide,
the gas and that's those are very, very cold bubbles of air. And as they come
out of the water, they burst and they combined with water vapor from this
water that we just pour. This is a warmer
container of water, and we get lots of water vapor, available the cold
temperatures, and this is actually some little droplets of water, which is a
cloud. So we just formed a cloud by reducing the temperature by adding
water vapor and creating this nice foggy mist that's spilling over the pot
and on into the table and onto the studio floor. So we did it, we made a
cloud. So how did we do it again? We cool the temperatures down to do point.
We added water vapor and that created our cloud that we have.
See that?
Here you go. That's our cloud. So let's go ahead and talk more about clouds and
the different types of clouds that we have another available.
So here had our white board. If science, we've got a blank slate. So what do we
need to do? Well, we start off with our air and we have water vapor in the air.
We need to have that current of air flowing up. And as we have that air
start to go up, what happens to the temperature? You already know the
answer. It starts to cool. The higher you go, the colder it gets. That's a
simple little thing that you could remember. Just keep that in the back
here, mind the higher you go, the colder it gets. And as temperatures
drop, they get closer and closer to what we call dew point. So let's saying
right here is that level of dew point. That's the temperature
that you need to get down to for clouds to form. You ever wonder why some of
those big puffy clouds always have flat bottoms to him? That's because that's
where condensation occurs. Is right there a dew point, and then we get the
clouds and start to form. So this is a cumulus cloud, and you know why they
call it a cumulus clown? Because it's, Ah, Mull accumulates. You got the bill
piled up. It's a heaping cloud, and so any time you have clouds that are piled
up or heaping are kind of like collie flower cotton candy like that where
they're all stacked up on top of each other. Those air cumulus clouds. Now,
what's interesting about clouds and the when you're when you're describing
clouds or labeling clouds, they come at different elevations, and the name's
air. A lot of the same names are similar, but we have three. You have
low level clouds that her down here, saddle the way, so you have your little
level clowns that go from the surface to a few 1000 feet up, and then you
have your mid level clouds
and then you have your high clouds.
High clouds are usually made out of just ice crystals, and they are also
labeled there a syrah form cloud. So they call these the Cirrus clouds. And
that's what we've had. We had some serious clouds today, up in the sky s
so what we have is just our normal, serious clown,
which is kind of wispy. I'm gonna go ahead. We're not Erase this. We have
more room
morning here in this
all right.
And these are the thin, wispy clouds that you'll see. Sometimes they call a
mayor's tail. They look very feathery or hair like on that's where they get
their name. So this is just a regular serious clown. You can also have high
cirrus clouds that are layer that kind of blanket the sky. Sometimes you might
see some of those and these air called a serial Stratus cloud.
And so it's kind of like just a layer, and they're see through because they're
very thin. But they're called a cirrus stratus clown, and then you have
another one that's called a syrah cumulus cloud and get back to that
heaping. So they're just little puffs of clouds.
And again, they're not very thick
little puffs and easier
zero
cumulus clouds. The first year. So you have three different. Give your heap
clouds your puffy clouds. You have your layered clouds, your stratus clouds. If
you've ever been interested in geology and you talk about the earth and the
different strata, that's all layers. And so that's what this is a layered
cloud. And then just your regular serious ice crystal clouds here at the
high level clouds now in the middle level,
um, they put the term alto in front of it. So you have your alto clouds,
and you can have you can have serious alittle serious because those air high
clouds So this your mid level clouds. But you can have alto cumulus clouds
and alto stratus clouds. So let's go. Let's alto
alto Stratus clouds. So what? What is that gonna describe that's gonna
describe kind of a layered, a little bit thicker cloud like that, not heap
not piled up, but just kind of layered. And then you have the
alto cumulus,
which is going to be a little bit more puffy. So you see that cloud kind of
puff up like that? So you have the layered clouds, and then you have the
puffy clouds, Alto Meade's mid level. So we're talking about above a few 1000
feet. So we're looking at it over over 5 to 6000 feet is where you're gonna
run into those mid level clouds. High clouds are going to be up close to
10,000 feet or higher. 10 to 20,000 feet is what we're looking at in that
range. They just have a little level clouds, the little level clouds. Well,
they are. They don't have you no prefix here. They don't have the serious. You
don't have the alto, so you take that away. And so all we have are like your
stratus clouds, which are just low level kind of flat clouds that hang out
down here. And then you have your so that's just your Stratos.
And then you have just your regular cumulus clouds
and that your cumulus
just floating around lazily. In fact, you have this those little fair weather
clouds that are floating around and they are called cumulus. Cumulus Clouds
are very humble. Little clouds that are floating around when they're small and
puffy look like little cotton balls floating around. So you haven't You'll
meet cumulus. You have your Stratos Are there any other types of clouds? Well,
we have some very low clouds when it's down on the surface, and that's called
fog.
And so we can put that down here, and that's also a Stratus cloud at the
surface. And so we're gonna put
fog down here, and then we also have those clouds that go from the low level
that are very, very industrious. And they're shooting for the stars, and
they start down here at the surface. But then you know what they dio. They
grow and they grow and they grow. And you can have some that go all the way
up here and form cumulus clouds.
You know what those arm
that's called a thunderstorm and this is actually a cumulus nimbus cloud
Nimbus. When you add that to that cloud means it's a rain cloud. You also have
stratus clouds that have rain,
and if you're Stratus Cloud has rain coming out of it.
That's called a
mmm Bo
Stratos.
There's your name Bo word. That means it's gotta rain. And then over here you
have a cumulus nimbus that but the cumulus first, but the rain on the
backside. So let's write that here cume
you low.
So have our cumulonimbus. We have are nimble Stratos, and this has to have
rain. Of course, if it's going to be
cumulonimbus
and then if it has some lightning coming out of it,
then it's a thunderstorm. And so these are the different types of clouds of
different layers. So when you're looking, it could be kind of hard to
judge. But it's actually interesting how clouds they do. They layer up and
they don't have to be going in the same direction. The clouds that are in the
upper layers can we go in one direction. Clouds in the middle layer could be
going a different direction, and the clouds and lower layer can also be
traveling in a different direction, so they're not always traveling altogether.
But these are the basic. There's lots of different. There's hundreds of
difference of types of clouds that form, and so I would highly encourage you to
take the time to look up clouds and maybe find a few. In fact, if you see
some cute clouds that are crossing the sky that you don't really recognize or
don't really fall into any of these categories, look it up again. Like I
said, there's a lot of different clouds. There's a lot to learn out there, and I
want you to keep on asking questions about these things. But now you know
how clouds form, how to form your own clouds, and then you have the different
types of clouds and the classifications, whether they're a local eyeing cloud,
whether they're in the mid levels of the atmosphere or in the upper layers
of the atmosphere. You have the different prefixes and different
suffixes that you put on there, the beginnings of their names, the ends of
their names and what they mean, whether they're layered cloud, whether they're
a cumulus cloud or puffy cloud, or whether they're a cirrus cloud with a
really thin. And I see these cold clouds are very, very cold up where the
planes fly when you're flying across the nation, and so we have the
different types of clouds out there, so I would highly recommend find out more
about clouds. They're really on their really interesting to learn about, and
there's so much to learn with the weather, so that'll do it for today.
Hopefully you learn something just like I did, and we're able to learn together.
If you have any questions, feel free. You can put him in the comments on your
Facebook page or my Facebook page. Or you can email me at de ver dorn at
hearst dot com that d v e R D o r n at Hearst h e a r s t dot com Ask me your
questions and we'll try to find out those answers together. Thanks for
joining me today. Make sure you look up in the sky and try to figure out what
kind of clouds are floating by and enjoy the weather.
Wait.