Weather or not?

[Pangloss62]

What's the atmosphere doing in your area?

Last evening here in the ATL, a line of thunderstorms marched across the city from West to East. As they arrived, they were accompanied by strong outflow (downdrafts) and the concomitant "scud" clouds.


This shot is from the Midwest, but it's the same phenomena.

You can't have scud clouds without strong outflow. Such outflow from thunderstorms is relatively cool compared to the air at the surface so it sinks to the ground and then pushes the warmer air up below the storm to create the scud clouds. Then they are caught up in the outflow and streak around the base of the storm. It really is one of my favorite weather-related phenomena. They looked very menacing last night but the storms actually weakened by the time they got to my neighborhood. Nonetheless, for about an hour, it looked like the coming apocalypse.