Edhat Staff
This article has been updated with more photos of storm clouds submitted by edhat readers.
Before the storm arrived in Santa Barbara on Wednesday, edhat readers captured photos of some eerie clouds hovering over our skies.
“The clouds looked like a monochrome Jupiter was hovering over Noleta this morning,” wrote edhat’s resident astronomer Chuck McPartlin.
Based on our internet sleuthing, these could be Mammatus clouds, pouch-like protrusions hanging from the undersides of clouds. They typically hang out under thunderstorm anvil clouds.
They’re primarily composed of ices, and groups of them can extend hundreds of miles in any direction. But they only remain visible for maybe 10 or 15 minutes at a time.
Either way, it’s an interesting sight to see.
Wednesday “wave clouds”
According to several sources these amazing clouds were asperitas clouds. Here is a link to a great description and YouTube link of timelapse video.
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/learn-about/weather/types-of-weather/clouds/other-clouds/asperitas
Excellent link!
Thanks all for the great pix. I enjoyed standing out in light rain for a moment looking at these clouds that seemed to be coming in from a SouthEasterly direction. That surprised me, having seen on radar earlier that it was coming from nearly due South. Back inside I looked at satellite imagery in more detail and noticed that lower level clouds were SE while upper level were S. Before seeing this fun Edhat post, I was already wondering if the interface of two different wind directions was creating the funky looking cloud bases. What do you think? Some sort of wind shear turbulence making for the undulating cloud bases?
Thanks for the photos, Chuck.
Another great one from Mike Eliason:
https://www.noozhawk.com/light-showers-kick-off-several-days-of-wet-weather-for-santa-barbara-county/