The National Weather Service has released some incredible photos of the wildfires impacting the western United States. 

In the included photo you can see what six wildfires in Montana and Wyoming look like from space.  The photos are from the MODIS satellite that snaps photos of our planet as it orbits Earth.

In the photo you can see the distinction between smoke and clouds quite clearly.  In the photo, clouds look like a collection of cotton balls.  They are a more true white color and limited more toward the northern half of the photo.  The smoke can be identified by its grayish color, texture and shape.  The prevailing winds push the smoke to drift eastward over the landscape. 

This has been a very rough wildfire season so far. Colorado is seeing some astonishingly destructive fires that are encroaching on cities like Colorado Springs. 

Weather obviously plays an enormous role in how wildfires act.  Wind can blow embers from one fire and create a new one in an entirely different location.  Low humidity keeps the atmosphere dry and primes the landscape for kindling. 

Even when thunderstorms develop over wildfires it’s often a curse instead of a blessing.  Dry air is able to work into the storms, so essentially all you get is gusty winds, lightning and very little rain.  The wind helps fan the flames and lightning can get more going.

Though the west is known best for wildfires, we can, have and do get wildfires here.  Be sure to take caution, especially with the 4^th of July holiday approaching on open flames and fireworks when outdoors. 

For a color coded map of all ofWisconsin’s counties that details the wildfire risk, follow this link from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources: http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/ForestFire/restrictions.asp.

Posted under Clouds, Drought, Environment, Fire, Heat, Natural Disasters, Nature, new media, Science, Space, Summer, Weather History, Weather NEws, Weather Safety, Wind

The positioning of the International Space Station and the mostly clear skies forecast over much of Wisconsin tonight will make for decent viewing of the space station overnight, according to the satellite sighting schedule from NASA.

The International Space Station has been visible over Wausau at five times on Saturday June 9^th.  Three viewing windows were available early this morning.  Two more remain tonight. 

According to the sighting schedule, the space station can be seen at 10:17PM and 11:55PM tonight. 

Additional viewing windows early Sunday morning are available at 1:31 AM and 3:07AM.    

To find specific information on where to look and to see the Wausau Satellite Sighting schedule, follow this link: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/cities/view.cgi?country=United_States&region=Wisconsin&city=Wausau.

Posted under astronomy, Clouds, Space

 

 

We’ve had some pretty cool towering thunderstorm clouds build up recently in parts of the TV-9 viewing area, but nothing compared to some freakish supercell clouds captured in recent weeks over the Plains.

 

 

Check out this one below from near Loma, Montana on June 4th.  It was captured on film by Roger Hill, a professional storm chaser. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is another shot of that storm when it was producing a tornado.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back on May 21st, 2012 near Adrian, Texas another “mothership” cloud was spotted by Chris Gullikson with Tempest Tours.  The corkscrew appearing cloud below is quite the sight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As if that weren’t enough, mother nature treated some to another fantastic looking supercell cloud near Vega, Texas.  The photo below is courtesy of Weather-Photos.NET. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These special supercell clouds are rotating columns with strong updrats going right up through the middle of the corkscrew.  Often times tornadoes form in an area of the spiral where a cool downdraft punches into it and tightens the circulation.  Not all supercell storms produce such visually stunning structures.  Some high precipitation supercells are obscured in sheets of rain and hail and heavy hazy clouds that make it hard to pick out individual swirls.  The “mothership” corkscrew clouds are usually seen in the western Plains where the air is typically drier and clouds bases perhaps a bit higher as well.

I want to thank my son, Douglas Schumacher, who helped gather the information for this blog post. 

 

Posted under Clouds, Severe Weather, Storms, Tornadoes