Hole-punch Clouds and Chewbacca
It’s Saturday. I will have even fewer blog visitors than on a work-day. I don’t have to find the narrative thread that ties any one thing with another. It’s my blog. I have a full cup of coffee. And the grand daughters are still asleep. So there.
As a life-long cloud-watcher, you can imagine my excitement to see images and read about a new kind of cloud discovered, that is not, well, natural. It is produced by airplanes, and these same plane-cloud combinations can create two kinds of snowfall: one that is narrow and corresponds to the aircraft’s path as it passes through this certain kind of cloud layer; and the other, a snowfall that might cover a considerable stretch of the landscape and leaves a circular hole in the sky. Read about it (or listen) at NPR.
And with a whip-lash change of direction, pictured, an unnamed new species of wildlife (of which there has been an ample showing lately) that I think is probably related to Chewie, though R2D2 was not spotted up Nameless Creek Valley. I will tell you this was during a session a friend and I have come to call “Solving World Problems One Six-pack At a Time.” We do it for the planet. You’re welcome.
Related articles
- How Airplanes Blow Snow-Making Holes in Clouds (wired.com)
- Airplanes Can Cause Extra Rainfall (newser.com)
Fred First holds masters degrees in Vertebrate Zoology and physical therapy, and has been a biology teacher and physical therapist by profession. He moved to southwest Virginia in 1975 and to Floyd County in 1997. He maintains a daily photo-blog, broadcasts essays on the Roanoke NPR station, and contributes regular columns for the Floyd Press and Roanoke's Star Sentinel. His two non-fiction books, Slow Road Home and his recent What We Hold in Our Hands, celebrate the riches that we possess in our families and communities, our natural bounty, social capital and Appalachian cultures old and new. He has served on the Jacksonville Center Board of Directors and is newly active in the Sustain Floyd organization. He lives in northeastern Floyd County on the headwaters of the Roanoke River.
Maybe one more six pack would have brought R2D2 forth!!
Love the drying-off dog! Go, Tsuga!!
Actually, this is Tsuga’s 125 pound friend, Jesse, visiting for the afternoon. He makes Tsuga look tiny. And boy does he get nasty when he does a belly-flop in the creek water-sand-and-mud!
Wow. The cloud/snow phenomena are amazing. And just as amzing that they are just now being understood.
I love the picture!
I’ve got two big bloodhounds, one weighs 135, the other 130. Even though they have short hair they absorb water like a sponge. And when they do the shake, rattle, and roll to remove all excess moisture it sends water vapor and massive amounts of drool into absolute orbit.
Liked this post a lot.