Multiple cloud layers

[Don]

In both my flight training and weather education in school I learned that cumulous clouds form when warm moist air cools to the dew point and small droplets form around particles or dust and the result are visible clouds. That makes rational sense.

What puzzles me is how there can be 2, 3 or more layers of clouds within the first 6-8 thousand feet. Now that I'm flying an RV I find it isn't simply a matter of getting on top - sometimes there's multiple layers of clouds to deal with. I'm not so much interested in how to deal with flying between layers (the FARs pretty well cover the requirements) what I'd like to know is how this happens. Clearly there is something lacking in my weather knowledge skill, and I'm a firm believer in what I don't know can kill me.

So how do you get a scattered layer at 4,200', a broken layer at 5,500', and a ceiling at 8,000' like we had here in Richmond, VA Saturday afternoon? It seems to me all the rising moisture would condense at 4,200' in this example but it doesn't appear to work that way. How are the other cloud layers, which appear to be cumulous clouds, formed?

I also figure that if I understood this process, it might influence my decision making in some cases.

To the Moderators - lacking a Weather Topic to post this in, I picked safety since weather and safety are linked so closely in aviation. However, feel free to move this where you think it's appropriate.

 

[colojo]

I'm no weather expert but my guess would be that between the layers, where it is clear, the temperature of the air is greater than the dewpoint. Moist air can still rise through this region, then condense up higher when it hits another region where the temperature is less than the dewpoint.

Another explanation is that you can have a low level, moist airmass coming from one direction with clouds in it, and a high level, moist airmass coming from a different direction much higher up that also has clouds in it. I've seen this many times.

There are probably dozens of other possible scenarios.

 

[rzbill]

A self education method might be to google the term "skew-t" and read the resultant sites that describe that particular diagram. It is a chart that shows many atmospheric conditions (including dew point) in a single cross section of the atmosphere. The multiple cloud layers should be indicated by the skew-T. It should show WHY the clouds are there, and that goes to the OPs question.

Admittedly, I have become fascinated by them because they are crammed with so much info they are hard for me to read (as a non-meteorologist) and I want to get to the point that I can easily do so.

 

[turbo]

Wow, what a great question. In all my years of flying and reading about wx I don't recall an answer for you. My advice is to get a book by robert buck called weather flying or something like that. The next advice is to get an ifr rating. Now the real fun begins. You never know all there is to know about aviating. Wish you lived close by, I would give you my book.

 

[Mark Dickens]

Aviation Weather Workshop

The answer to your question lies in a complex interaction of the environmental temperature, the dewpoint, the dry adiabatic lapse rate, and the moist adiabatic lapse rate. All of this is charted on something called a Skew T Log P chart. Bottom line is that the atmosphere is not monolithic and can have layers that exhibit different characteristics, thus leading to layered clouds, etc.

I was going to post a link to a NOAA site about the Skew T Log P chart, but the bureaucrats have blocked it now because of the "shut down"...

By the way, an excellent site for learning more about aviation weather is http://www.avwxworkshops.com And no, I'm not connected in any way, shape or form to that website.