Minus 111 degrees: the new record for cold in the clouds that could mean a “perfect storm”

An unprecedented cold temperature was measured on a severe thunderstorm cloud in the Pacific Ocean by a satellite in Earth orbit. This temperature of -111 degrees Celsius It is over 30 degrees cooler than typical storm clouds and is the coldest known measure of storm cloud temperature, according to a study by Dr. Proud simon, researcher of NCEO (National Earth Observation Center) of United Kingdom.

In the lowest part of the atmosphere of the To land, known as the troposphere, the air temperature decreases with altitude and can reach as low as -90 ° C in the tropics. Thunderstorms and tropical cyclones can develop at high altitudes, up to 18 kilometers and so the tops of these storm clouds are getting extremely cold.

Temperature sensors on board satellites orbiting the Earth can detect these cold clouds – allowing meteorologists to monitor these storms and issue severe weather warnings. On December 29, 2018, the sensor VIIRS aboard the American satellite NOAA-20 a strong storm swept over the southwestern Pacific, about 400 kilometers south of Nauru.

This storm was so powerful that it crossed the troposphere and the stratosphere; continue to cool as it gained altitude even though the surrounding air was warmer – an event known as a peak peak.

According to the Spanish newspaper ABC, storms take on an anvil-like shape when they reach the top of the troposphere, the lowest in Earth’s atmosphere. However, if a storm has unusual energy, it will reach the next layer, the stratosphere. This phenomenon, according to the Madrid environment, causes thunderstorm clouds to reach very high altitudes, where the temperatures are really freezing.

This excess led the storm cloud to become the coldest storm cloud temperature on record, -111 degrees Celsius, and the upper part of the clouds reached an altitude of more than 20.5 kilometers above sea level. “This storm has reached an unprecedented temperature that pushes the limits of what current satellite sensors are capable of measuring.“, Explain Proud it is a statement.

“We have found that these really cold temperatures seem to be becoming more and more common, with the same number of extremely cold temperatures in the past 3 years as in the previous 13 years. This is important because colder cloud storms tend to be more extreme and more dangerous for people on the ground due to hail, lightning, and wind. Now we need to understand if this increase is due to our changing climate or if it is due to a “perfect storm” of weather conditions that has produced outbreaks of extreme thunderstorms in recent years.“Added the scientist.

(With information from Europa Press and the media) .-

KEEP READING: