2nd October 2019

nationalgeographic

15

How high do clouds float?

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Clouds are classified into four basic categories, depending largely on the height of their bases above the ground. High-level clouds, called cirrus clouds, can reach heights of 20,000 feet (6,000 meters) and are typically thin. They do not produce rain and often indicate fair weather. They are usually made up of ice.

Similarly one may ask, do clouds have weight?

According to scientists, the weight of the average cumulus cloud is 1.1 million pounds! Think about that for a moment. This means that at any given moment, there are millions of pounds of water floating above your head. That's the equivalent of 100 elephants.

Are clouds lighter than air?

Maybe clouds “float” for the same reason that helium balloons float. Maybe they are lighter than air. That can't be true because we know that clouds are made of water. Water is not lighter than air - water does not float.

How do clouds not fall down?

The downward gravitational force on the cloud droplets is balanced by the upward force by rising air from below. In a bulk sense, the cloud itself is lighter than the air it occupies, so it is buoyant. Although, in a sense clouds do fall. It's called rain.

1

Can you sit on a cloud?

Clouds are a bunch of liquid water droplets that are so small they can be thrown around by the wind, physicists call that a suspension. Therefore, sitting on a cloud is sitting on miniscule water droplets. It's actually even worse, because a lake is 100% water, so you get surface tension and buoyancy.

2

How high is the lowest cloud?

These clouds can form as low as 2,000 m (6,500 ft) above surface at any latitude, but may be based as high as 4,000 m (13,000 ft) near the poles, 7,000 m (23,000 ft) at mid latitudes, and 7,600 m (25,000 ft) in the tropics.

3

What does it feel like to be inside a cloud?

What does it feel like when we touch clouds? A cloud is made of water droplets or tiny ice crystals. As the water droplets rise high in the sky, the air gets cooler, causing the water droplets to adhere to particles of dust in the air. The droplets are so light they float in the air.

4

Why do clouds float at different heights?

Rising air expands as the pressure on it decreases, and that expansion into thinner, high-altitude air causes cooling. Enough cooling eventually makes water vapor condense, which contributes to the survival and growth of the clouds. Thus, from our vantage on the ground, clouds seem to float in the sky.

5

How fast are the clouds moving right now?

High cirrus clouds can move more than 100 miles per hour. Storm clouds usually move around 30 to 40 miles per hour. Remember that clouds don't actually move on their own, the wind pushes them. But those are around the average speeds.

6

How high is the highest clouds?

The highest clouds in the atmosphere are cirrocumulus, cirrus, and cirrostratus. Cumulonimbus clouds can also grow to be very high. The lowest clouds in the atmosphere are stratus, cumulus, and stratocumulus.

7

How high are stratus clouds in the sky?

2000 meters

8

Are the clouds heavy?

Clouds are not heavy. The water in a cloud can have a mass of several million tons. Every cubic metre (m3) of the cloud has only about 5 grams of water in it. Cloud droplets are also about 1000 times heavier than evaporated water, so they are much heavier than air.

9

Why are clouds gray?

However, rain clouds are gray instead of white because of their thickness, or height. That is, a cloud gets thicker and denser as it gathers more water droplets and ice crystals — the thicker it gets, the more light it scatters, resulting in less light penetrating all the way through it.

10

What causes the shape of a cloud?

Clouds form when the invisible water vapour in the air condenses into visible water droplets or ice crystals. There is water around us all the time in the form of tiny gas particles, also known as water vapour. There are also tiny particles floating around in the air - such as salt and dust - these are called aerosols.

11

What is the sky made up of?

The sky is really a blanket of gas around the planet that we call the atmosphere. When planet earth formed, the atmosphere was very then and just made of hydrogen and helium. Then volcanoes started to form and pumped out other gases like carbon dioxide and water vapour (… or steam).

12

Why are the clouds moving?

Clouds move because the wind is carrying the parcel of cloudy air along. Wind occurs at all levels of the atmosphere from the ground up to higher than a jumbo jet can fly. Sometimes there can be no wind on the ground, but cirrus clouds very high up can be seen moving because of the wind where they are.

13

Why do clouds rain?

When the air cools it condenses around some dust or other particles in the air, called condensation nuclei. These small droplets then become visible as clouds. Warm air can hold more moisture than cool air, so when the warmer air is cooled and the moisture condenses, it often rains more heavily.

14

Which clouds are best associated with a thunderstorm?

Typically, cumulus clouds are associated with pleasant weather where you can lie back on the grass and admire the sky.

Above: Fair weather cumulus clouds over a field (Courtesy Wikipedia)
Above: Textbook example of a towering cumulonimbus cloud (Courtesy Wikipedia)
Above: Layer of stratus clouds (Courtesy Wikipedia)

15

Which clouds cause rain?

Clouds that produce rain and snow fall into this category. ("Nimbus" comes from the Latin word for "rain.") Two examples are the nimbostratus or cumulonimbus clouds. Nimbostratus clouds bring continuous precipitation that can last for many hours.

16

Why can we see the clouds?

Clouds happen when there is more water in the air than it can hold. This forces whatever the air can't hold to condense, which forms tiny droplets, which in aggregate make clouds or fog. The question then becomes, why does the air have more water in it than it can hold only in some places.

17

Why do we have white clouds?

Unlike scattering in the sky or ocean, in which molecules are so small they only scatter blue and violet light, water droplets are large enough the scatter the entire spectrum. That's why clouds appear to be mostly white.

18

How is a cloud named?

The root word “cirro” (meaning “curl”) describes a high cloud that is usually composed of wispy ice crystals. The Latin word “alto” (“high”) indicates a cloud in the middle of the troposphere that is below the high cirro-type clouds. The prefix or suffix “nimbus” (“rain”) denotes a cloud that is causing precipitation.

19

How do the clouds hold so much water?

Because they are so small they are easily kept up by the rising air. So the reason that clouds can hold water droplets is because the air in clouds is rising, and the rising air keeps pushing the water droplets up. Basically, it's the same with snow, but a cloud holding snow or ice crystals must be colder.

20

How many miles are clouds?

Stratocumulus is a layered cumulus cloud about a mile above the ground. Altocumulus is a similar cloud at an altitude of 2 miles. Its greater distance from the ground makes the cumulus puffs appear smaller than those of stratocumulus clouds.

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