1. By: Courtney Smith

2. arm.html
Adiabatic Temperature Changes
and Expansion and Cooling
 Temperature changes that happen even though heat isn’t added or subtracted
from the atmosphere are adiabatic temperature changes.
 Air that is not saturated cools 10 degrees Celsius for every 1000 meters it goes is
the dry adiabatic rate.
 Wet adiabatic cooling is when air rises and condensation begins to happen,
then latent heat in water vapor from condensation is released.
 http://apollo.lsc.vsc.edu/classes/met130/notes/chapter6/adiab_warm.html


3. Orographic Lifting
 When land masses, such as mountains, block air flow, orographic lifting of the
air happens.
 Clouds and precipitation occur due to adiabatic cooling and cause
precipitation.
 Much of the air’s humidity is lost when air reaches the leeward side of the
mountain.
 http://www.examiner.com/outdoorsman-in-salt-lake-city/understanding-why-
utah-has-the-greatest-snow-on-earth-part-1-orographic-lifting

4. Frontal Wedging
 A front is when hot air and cold air meet in the atmosphere.
 Frontal wedging is when cool and dense air barriers warm and less
dense air that is rising.
 Storm-system weather fronts are also known as middle latitude
cyclones.
 http://www.wou.edu/las/physci/taylor/gs106/atm2_precip_files/frame.
htm#slide0004.htm

5. Convergence
 Convergence is when air in the lower part of the atmosphere flows together and
causes lifting.
 Florida’s weather is an example of convergence.
 When air flows in more than one direction, it begins to rise. It leads to
adiabatic cooling and sometimes cloud formation.

6. Localized Convective Lifting
 Thermals: Rising clumps of air warmer than the air around it.
 Localized Convective Lifting: The process that makes the rising thermals.
 Clouds can form when the warm air clumps rise above the condensation level.
 http://rst.gsfc.nasa.gov/Sect14/Sect14_1c.html

7. Stability
 Stable air resists moving upward.
 Unstable air rises as stable air stays in the same place.
 When air increases with height, air is the most stable.
This is a temperature inversion.

8. Condensation
 Air must be saturated for condensation to happen.
 Condensation nuclei occur when there is condensation
in the air above the ground.
 When condensation nuclei is in the air, relative
humidity goes over 100%
 http://keep3.sjfc.edu/students/kes00898/e-port/condensation%20page%20for%20unit.html

9. Types of Clouds
 Clouds are classified by form and height.
 Cirrus clouds are thin, white, and high in the air.
 Cumulounds clouds are round, individual clouds.
Stratus clouds are big clouds that cover almost the
whole sky.
 http://eo.ucar.edu/webweather/cloud3.html

10. High Clouds
 Cirrocumulous clouds are fluffy clouds.
 Cirrostratus clouds are flatter clouds.
 Cirrus clounds are high, white, and thin clouds.

11. Middle Clouds
 Altocumulouds clouds are large, dense, and round clouds.
 Altostratus clouds are white and grayish clouds that cover the
sky, moon, and sun but they are still noticeable through it.
 Middle clouds are from 2000 to 6000 meters in the air.
 http://www.allstar.fiu.edu/aero/fltenv3.htm

12. Clouds of Verticle Development
 Most start in the low range but are vertically long and
go to the high or medium ranges in the air.
 Caused by unstable air.
 Made by upward movement, and powerful
acceleration.
 http://www.free-online-private-pilot-ground-school.com/Aviation-Weather-Principles.html

13. Low Clouds
 Stratus clouds are clouds that look like fog and cover
the sky.
 Stratocumulus clouds are clouds that have a scalloped
bottom that looks like long rods or patches.
 Nimbostratus clouds are rain clouds.
 http://www.free-online-private-pilot-ground-school.com/Aviation-Weather-Principles.html

14. Fog
 A cloud that is very close to the ground.
 Happens when Earth cools rapidly by radiation.
 Cool air goes over warm water, evaporation occurs, air
becomes saturated, and water vapor meets cold air and
it condenses and mixes with the warm air being
warmed.
 http://photoshoptutorials.ws/photoshop-tutorials/photo-effects/fog.html

15. Cold Cloud Precipitation
 Supercooled water is water in the liquid state at 0
degrees Celcius that will freeze when it hits a solid
object.
 When air is saturated with water, it is supersaturated
with ice.
 http://nanopatentsandinnovations.blogspot.com/2010/06/amount-of-dust-pollen-matters-for-cloud.html

16. Warm Cloud Precipitation
 The collision-coalescence process is the process that creates raindrops.
 Particles, such as salt, in the air absorb water so realitive humidity goes below
100% makeing large rain drops.
 The large drops go through the cloud and they join with smaller water droplets.
 https://www.meted.ucar.edu/sign_in.php?go_back_to=http%253A%252F%252Fwww.meted.ucar.edu
%252Ftropical%252Ftextbook_2nd_edition%252Fprint_5.htm

17. Rain and Snow
 Snowflakes usually melt when the temerature at the surface is above 4 degrees Celcius, so
snowflakes usually melt before they hit the ground.
 When there is a low humidity, snow crystals form.
 Snow crystals mix together into clumps when the temerature is above -5 degrees celcius.
 http://kohd.com/page/213587
 http://roymiller.hubpages.com/hub/quotes-about-rain

18. Sleet, Glaze, and Hail
 Sleet is small pieces of ice falling from the clouds.
 Glaze is freezing rain that happens when rain is supercooled.
 Hail is small ice pieces that grow as they fall by collecting supercooled water. Hail can
become very, very large. Some can even be the size of softballs.
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sleet_on_the_ground.jpg
 http://www.tornadochaser.net/hail.html

19. The End!