Distant Storm Viewed from Chiclana de la Frontera, Spain

June 20, 2012

Cloud over Andalusian-Spain Manuel Castillo12small (4)
 

Photographer: Manuel Castillo; Manuel's Web site
Summary Author: Manuel Castillo; Jim Foster

The photo above (top) shows a massive distant storm that developed over southern Spain during the afternoon of March 13, 2012. At bottom is a satellite view (EUMETSAT) of the lower Iberian Peninsula showing the location of this huge storm cell as well as several others. On the satellite image, the black dot at bottom left represents my location in Chiclana de la Frontera, Spain -- my view of the cloud mass is portrayed by the V-shaped white lines. The storm was over Seville, Spain to the northeast of Chiclana de la Frontera and spanned a distance about 80 mi (128 km) from west to east. Using trigonometry to determine the height of the cloud, the angle between the horizon and the top of the cloud is estimated to be 10 degrees and since the distance to the cloud is about 50 mi (80 km) then the height of the cloud would be approximately 8.8 mi (14.2 km).