What are
Kelvin-Helmholtz Clouds?
Kelvin-Helmholtz clouds are one of the rarest and most fleeting formations, this cartoon-like breaking wave is the Holy Grail for many cloud-spotters.
The crashing wave pattern is caused when swift, warm air flows over a colder, denser, more sluggish layer. As physicists William Kelvin and Hermann von Helmholtz discovered, the difference in the speeds and densities of these fluids creates a shearing force where they meet, producing undulations in the boundary between the two.
If the speed difference is just right, the tops of the denser ripples can roll up, surge forwards, and tip over in a series of vortices, just like a breaking ocean wave. When clouds happen to form at the horizontal boundary, this invisible air process is briefly made visible.
Though beautiful, these turbulent atmospheric waves are a sign that the air is extremely unstable and may be dangerous to aircraft.
The crashing wave pattern is caused when swift, warm air flows over a colder, denser, more sluggish layer. As physicists William Kelvin and Hermann von Helmholtz discovered, the difference in the speeds and densities of these fluids creates a shearing force where they meet, producing undulations in the boundary between the two.
Though beautiful, these turbulent atmospheric waves are a sign that the air is extremely unstable and may be dangerous to aircraft.
