[Music] clouds they bring thunder rain and darkness wherever they go and can even cause damage through flooding and blizzards for these reasons and more most people have a negative association with clouds and many of us have forgotten just how important in clouds truly are in our environment they played the vital role of delivering fresh water from the oceans on to land through rain without clouds most land would be dry and inhospitable there'd be no drinking water and agriculture would be impossible so I think it's about time we learned more about them in this video we're learning all things clouds there are three types of clouds cumulus Stratus and cirrus cumulus clouds are the big white puffy ones in Latin cumulants heap or pile because they kind of look like big piles of flops these clouds typically form low to the ground less than two thousand meters up in the lower levels of the atmosphere but since they grow vertically they can reach much higher altitudes then there's stratus clouds in Latin Strato means layer and these form flat horizontal cloud sheets with hardly any distinguishable features when people say it's cloudy out it's usually because there's a Stratus cloud overhead stratus clouds also have possibly the greatest impact on the climate because they form wide spreading layers that reflect sunlight away from the surface effectively cooling the earth these also form in the lower levels of the atmosphere and can even become fog under the right conditions lastly there's cirrus clouds which in Latin connotes a wisp of hair which i think is a pretty good description these clouds form high in the atmosphere anywhere from 7,000 to 14,000 meters up so high in fact that they usually consist of ice crystals instead of water droplets the high speed winds of the upper atmosphere blow cirrus clouds faster than most other clouds and a lot of the time they'll proceed storms to come knowing these three types of clouds so now we can use the words used to describe them first there's Alto which basically means tall or high this is used to describe clouds that originate in the lower atmosphere but which have gotten pulled into the mid atmosphere anywhere from two thousand to seven thousand meters above the ground so an alto cumulus cloud is just a cumulus cloud above 2,000 meters and the same thing with altostratus these will always look smaller than regular cumin or stratus clouds there are no also cirrus clouds because cirrus form above the mid atmosphere already then there's zero which kind of gets confusing but hang basically it means very high like double Altos although although so an auto cumulus cloud that makes it above 7000 meters into the highest reaches of the atmosphere would be a cero cumulus cloud and same for Stratus becoming a serious Stratus you can tell these aren't regular cirrus clouds because they aren't wispy just really small then there's the exciting one Nimbus which translates to rain clouds first there's cumulonimbus cumulus clouds that produce rain which can become tremendous thunderstorms sometimes large enough to occupy all three layers of the atmosphere at once you also have nimbostratus which as you might have guessed are flat sheets of rain clouds there's no such thing as a Ciro Nimbus cloud either altogether it looks like this cumulus and Stratus are down here Cirrus are all the way up here Alto cumulus and altostratus clouds are right here zero cumulus and Sewer Stratus are right above those cumulonimbus are just huge and nimbostratus are not so much there are also stratocumulus clouds which have similarities to both Stratus and cumulus clouds forming a puffy sheet of clouds then there's something called a lenticular cloud which are stationary and tend to look like disks or saucers these form when something's disturbing airflow like a mountain which causes a swirling area called an eddy behind it when warm moist air gets trapped in this Eddy the vapor can condense to form a visible cloud okay so now that we know all that we can start getting into cloud species this is where things become a bit complicated and a little tedious but like super fun too as each described cloud type has its own internal classification starting with Cirrus there's Cirrus 5 greatest which form long streaks or fibers across the sky then we have Cirrus insanest which means curly hooks because that's what they look like honestly if you know Latin this is all very easy after that there's Syrah suspicious which are more dense threads of cirrus clouds cirrus vacas look like Tufts of wool almost like cirrocumulus but these are made entirely out of ice cast alanis means fort so Cirrus cast elena's forms towers and are usually blown off the tops of other clouds and lastly there's Cirrus and tortoise which means twisted or wound and they more or less look like balls of knotted string now for cirrocumulus first two there's zero cumulus strata formas which yes is all three types of cloud in one order of the words really this is when there are so many cirrocumulus clouds that they form a sheet over the sky then there's zero cumulus flaccus fluffier Tufts of wool and cirrocumulus cast alanis which are slightly more visible towers and then we have cirrocumulus Lakha gnosis which means full of hollows and are perforated with circular holes for cirrostratus there are only two species cirrostratus vibrate disks which again are very similar to serous vibrators but a bit more sheet-like and then cirrostratus and nebulosa which is a very thin sometimes imperceivable high-altitude sheet of ice sometimes the Sun will hit them just at the right angle to make a spectacular shining halo in the sky then we have altocumulus there's also cumulus strata formas which are low-lying sheets of puffy clouds altocumulus lenticularis as those are the cool stationary ones altocumulus Castellanos which are very puffy towers and also cumulus flaccus which are more little Tufts of wool altocumulus Lac enosis are basically the same as zero cumulus like enosis just a tad closer to the ground in the mid atmosphere we're doing all things clouds so if this feels like a lot you better strap in next we have Auto Stratus some of which are actually pretty cool first there's also Stratus undulate us which look like little waves or rows as undulate us basically means waves altostratus duplicate EES is just when two layers of ultra stratus clouds are on top of each other there aren't any pictures of this because well one layer blocks the other that's how it works but typically because there's more than one layer of clouds they'll block out more light although Stratus panas are very chaotic and look like they were ripped away from other clouds altostratus translucid asar very thin and if you couldn't tell is translucent meaning you can see the Sun through them then there's also Stratus opaque guess which are basically the opposite meaning you cannot see the Sun through them Alto Stratus radiators are like five Freitas clouds but all filled in running parallel to each other towards the horizon and lastly we have Alta Stratus mammatus which are fun they're like hanging pouches and are named after mammaries they're also pretty rare for plain stranded clouds we have Stratus practice which are just small sheets fractured from larger mother clouds due to high winds these change very quickly and don't last very long as a result Stratus nebulosa is another thin foggy cloud layer this time much closer to the ground Stratus underlay does form low-lying cloud wait these are quite rare and hard to spot so don't really worry about them next we have stratocumulus clouds first is stratocumulus strata formas which if you're counting is to mentions of strata form in one name these are the most common types of cloud cover in the world they're basically fluffy flat clouds that split off them then there's stratocumulus cumulant s which are the flat clouds blown off the puffy tops of other cumulus clouds and we also have stratocumulus Castellana sand stratocumulus lenticularis which are very similar to other forms of castellana sand lenticular clouds Strutter cumulus like enosis are similar to panis clouds with many holes perforating the body of the cloud looking like it's being torn apart now we're on to cumulus clouds first there's cumulus humulus which are small cotton ball clouds that are more wide than they are tall they're often called Fairweather clouds and usually occur in groups during the summer cumulus medio chris are essentially the same they're just equally wide as they are tall and then cumulus congestus are the opposite taller than they are wide lastly cumulus fractus are the tiny bits of cumulus clouds ripped away from one another by the wind and I saved the best for last the cumulonimbus species first there's cumulonimbus calvess which are puffy all over even on top this means the water droplets at the top haven't reached temperatures cold enough to freeze into ice crystals once this happens however the top ice crystals spread out and become fibrous and the cloud becomes a cumulonimbus Kappa lattice this is when the cloud begins to take on an anvil shape roughly what's this happens for a while the cloud becomes what's known as a cumulonimbus and guess the final form of a thunderstorm these can grow to truly massive sizes and if they become powerful enough they can form what's known as a supercell which is basically a miniature hurricane these are the conditions which create tornadoes which can be some of the most dangerous natural hazards on the planet so that's it right well in 2017 a new type of cloud formation was added to the official list of cloud types the aspart as cloud type is extremely rare and not entirely understood but it can be identified by having waving or rolling undersides similar to the undulator species and looks super cool if you see one of these count yourself lucky and take picture alright that's all for classification now but there are a few phenomena I think are worth mentioning too here's some here odessan clouds which you only get when water droplets in a cloud are a particular size and correct angle to scatter incoming light as color then these are what's called Morning Glory clouds oddly satisfying rows of clouds so rare that only one place on earth has the conditions for them to form here in the Gulf of Carpentaria Australia this is what they look like from space though it's still unknown how exactly they form these clouds have features called Kelvin Helmholtz waves formed when two layers of fluid at different densities slide against each other shearing away the top and bottom of the layers pileus clouds formed when mother clouds grow too rapidly and usually form around a cumulonimbus right before it starts to rain but can also form around other cloud types as well here's one forming on an ash cloud from the eruption of sorry chef peak okay I think that's it for now let me know if there's anything else you'd like to know about clouds or if I missed anything thanks for watching until the end I hope you enjoyed this video and if you did please consider liking and subscribing to the channel where I'll be making more videos like this in the future thanks