Take a close look at these clouds. Just a bit of high cirrus, you’d probably think, right? Well, not exactly.
Today’s Photo of the Day manages to capture a very rare type of cloud that I’ve written about before; the ultra-high altitude Noctilucent cloud. These wisps of ice crystals can only be seen just before sunrise and in certain latitudes and most often within a month plus or minus of summer solstice in the northern hemisphere.
As Flickr user Kanelstrand mentions:
They are the highest clouds in the Earth’s atmosphere. They occur during summer, from mid-May to mid-August in the northern hemisphere and between mid-November and mid-February in the southern hemisphere. They are normally too faint to be seen, and are visible only when illuminated by sunlight from below the horizon while the lower layers of the atmosphere are in the Earth’s shadow. Noctilucent clouds are not fully understood and are a recently discovered meteorological phenomenon; there is no evidence that they were observed before 1885.
Noctilucent clouds can form only under very restrictive conditions; their occurrence can be used as a sensitive guide to changes in the upper atmosphere. Since their discovery the occurrence of noctilucent clouds has been increasing in frequency, brightness and extent. It is theorized that this increase is connected to climate change.
from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noctilucent_cloud
I’ve managed to capture these clouds in 2008 from the cockpit while flying to Europe just before the sun rises. It took years of crossings before I was able to finally see them inflight.
Thanks Kanelstrand!
Are you a Flickr user who’d like to share a travel related picture or two for our consideration? Submit it to Gadling’s Flickr group right now! We just might use it for our Photo of the Day!