Looking east on a balmy August afternoon, we are struck by the
towering clouds rising into the atmosphere. We are all familiar
with the persistent marine layer clouds of early summer. Winter
brings wet storm clouds from the ocean.Everyone has looked into
the sky and projected a common figure to a puffy white mass of
moisture. “Look at that dragon, there is the tail …” “Can you
see Africa up there?” But where do clouds come from? How do they
form and what can they tell us about the weather? Clouds are
masses of water droplets, ice crystals and dust that are visible
above the surface of the Earth. They exist in many different
sizes, shapes and compositions. Each different composition
represents differing conditions in the atmosphere. Earth’s
atmosphere is separated into layers based on altitude. The layer
that we are most familiar with begins at our feet and reaches an
altitude of about 40,000 feet. This is the troposphere and it
contains about 80 percent of the mass of the entire atmosphere
and almost all of t