photo #5027696

Laurie McCauley (Cloud Appreciation Society Member 50,667) marvelled at this Cumulonimbus capillatus incus towering over Providence, New York, US. The lower parts of the cloud were made up of water droplets, while the top region of this mature storm cloud was composed of ice crystals. Thunder rumbled nearby, but Laurie for the time being was dry. This anvil cloud, with its scalloped edge and lacy fringe, had climbed to the upper limits of the troposphere, the part of our atmosphere where weather happens. There, the cloud was spreading out beneath the change in the atmosphere’s temperature profile as its growing shadow swept across Laurie and the landscape below.