Cosmos Computed

Nothing beats a nice spring day on the slopes. The warm sun beams down, with its barely-filtered UV rays piercing through the thin air and frying all unprotected skin. The snow starts out icy, but before long it becomes soft and smooth, with slushy snow flying out at every turn. The weather can be really crazy - a couple years ago, Vail reopened for an extra weekend after closing when it was hit with a snowstorm that dumped 3 feet of snow. One of the best Spring skiing days I've ever experienced was nearly two months ago at Vail, a week before the closing date. Due to some lucky weather events, I experienced all three main types of snow conditions in a single day: ice, slush, and powder. The day started out like any other: hard snow covered the trails, frozen solid from the cold night before. Turns were difficult to make on this surface, as the skis could not carve on the ice. Clouds covered the sky. It was cold, but not frigid. View of the back bowls and Blue Sky Basin, taken from...

Blowing snow lit up by the sun, which recently set behind those two peaks A couple of days ago I went skiing. That's not unusual, because I love to ski. Every year I go skiing quite a few times - usually starting in November, when Arapahoe Basin opens, and ending in June, when the snow melts and they have to close. When I went skiing, I brought my camera to the ski resort and took a few pictures. I didn't take any videos or photos of the skiing, but I did take some photos of the moon above the mountains. If I come up to the mountains from Denver, there are two options to get to Arapahoe Basin. One option is to  take the I-70 through the Eisenhower tunnel, continue past Arapahoe Basin until the next exit, drive through Dillon, and then backtrack to the resort. When I go through the tunnel (which I don't very often), I like to hold my breath until I get to the other side. This is especially difficult when I run into a traffic jam halfway through. A quicker route is to get off...

A cold front clashed with the warm, moist air from monsoons in the south. As the warm air was cooled by the cold air, large clouds formed. The resulting rain began on the afternoon of September 10th where I live. It started out as a thunderstorm, like all of the other storms that we had this summer. This thunderstorm, however, was particularly impressive; there was crackling thunder and it just kept raining. I didn't think much of it, as we had been getting a few thunderstorms lately. The next day we had another thunderstorm. This one was special, because once the rain began it continued for the rest of the day. It stopped raining for a couple of hours around nightfall and I thought it was over, but I was wrong; the rain started up again later in the night, gently pouring from the sky. The next morning was cold and grey. I probably would have slept in if it weren't for the fact that I take part-time college courses. As it was, the rain was gently falling as we drove to the buil...

The sky was dark. Occasional raindrops pattered outside. Thunder rumbled. A computer geek sat in the glow of a computer, typing and staring at the screen as if in a trance. He happened to be working on an instant chat application, using HTML, CSS and JavaScript. When he was complete, he would host one version of the app on his Computer Science blog. He later hosted another version  HERE . Suddenly, the wind outside picked up all at once. As it howled, the windows cracked and popped. At one corner of the house came a spooky moaning sound. Only then did the geek come out of his trance; he stopped typing and turned towards the window. That geek was me. The reason I ceased to type was because I knew that the pickup of wind was unusual, and that it can be a sign of a nearby tornado. I scanned the fields, trying to guess approximately how strong the wind was. The wind had picked up dirt and was blowing it through the fields, so I knew from experience that the wind was particularly strong...

A cumulus cloud with pileus. This pileus is a small one. There are multiple pilei on the cloud in this photo. See if you can find them. A  Pileus , pronounced pie-lee-us , is a small, smooth, silky-looking lenticular (lens-shaped) cloud that can appear above parts of either a cumulus or cumulonimbus cloud. (If you don't know what a cumulus cloud is, click HERE . Cumulonimbus clouds are basically very large cumulus clouds.) A cloud attached to pileus is said to be "with pileus" or to "have pileus". Clouds with pilei can develop into very large cumulonimbus clouds. Pilei form when a strong updraft at a lower altitude acts upon air at a higher altitude, and causes it to cool below its dew point. The result is that as the air cools, the water vapor in it condenses and forms a cloud. Because of the conditions required for it to form, a pileus cloud is usually a sign of severe weather; the cloud that it forms above is likely to develop into a cumulonimbus if it hasn...

The actual sun appeared bright red, but my camera picked up some invisible radiation as violet. This photo was not enhanced. Last year was very dry. Wildfires raged through the state, and a firework ban on Independence Day made everybody even more sorry about the lack of water. I think this summer is turning out to be a repeat. So far we've had 3 historically significant fires: the  Black Forest Fire , which burned 14,280 acres and was the most destructive ever recorded in Colorado (in terms of property damage); the Royal Gorge Fire , which burned 3,800 acres and jumped the Royal Gorge; and the West Fork Complex , which is still burning 0% contained, and has so far burned more than 83,004 acres. Photos of an affected area, arranged  in chronological order. Just today, we watched a wildfire almost in our backyard, and saw the firefighters putting it out. We packed up in case we had to evacuate, but they got it under control and put it out. They had a helicopter with a wate...

Six days ago, a fire started in Black Forest, Colorado. The wind was very strong, and the fire quickly grew to become the most destructive fire in the history of Colorado. The smoke cloud looks a lot like this cumulus cloud; both were formed from warm rising air. That afternoon, I was able photograph the smoke cloud. You can see one of my photos at the top of this post. Notice the lighter area near the top of the cloud; that's caused by water vapor condensing out of the smoke. The following day, the air where we live was full of smoke from the fire. Then the wind changed and blew the smoke away, and we had fresh air for a while. That night, we were smoked out again. Wind that keeps changing over a wildfire can be bad. As we later learned, the fire had turned around and burned areas that had originally been spared. Not good. As of today, the fire is still burning, 75% contained. It has so far destroyed at least 483 homes and partially damaged 16 homes. Luckily, only 2 people we...

Finally - it's nice and warm outside. The meadowlarks are singing, and cumulus clouds fill the sky. In some places, this kind of weather has been going on for the past couple of months. Where I live, though, we've been having cool weather, so a 70° day seems very warm. Here are some of the pictures I took today: The photo above is of some purple mustard flowers. I really don't like purple mustard, but unfortunately it always comes with summer where I live. Sure, purple mustard might look okay, but it smells awful. This is a western meadowlark. I wanted to get a photo showing his breast, which is yellow with a black V, but he was always facing the wrong direction. Whenever I moved to a different angle, he changed position accordingly. So I had to be satisfied with a photo of his back. Dark, big clouds, with precipitation. Precipitation is what water is called when it condenses and falls out of the sky. Rain and snow are forms of precipitation; so is hail. Meteors are not. A ...

Cumulus is the Latin word for pile or heap , and cumulus clouds certainly fit their name! They look like fluffy mounds of whipped cream floating in the sky, and often have a shape similar to that of a cauliflower.  Cumulus clouds form when relatively warm, moist air rises and cools below the dew point. The moisture in it then condenses into tiny water droplets, which form the cloud. The relative humidity (how "full" the air is with water) helps determine the height at which the moisture condenses at, which is the base of the cloud. In this little video I made, you can see how the clouds form, with the moist air appearing a light mist rising out of the ground. The moist air is not visible in reality, but I added it to help illustrate the idea: A cumulus cloud constantly undergoes change, as long as moist air continues to rise under it. The water droplets at the edge of the cloud usually evaporate, so the cloud loses water as it gains it. In a time-lapse, the clouds appear t...

On the day after the June 5th Venus transit, which was the last until 2117, we had the first big thunderstorm of the year. Before the storm, it rained. Usually we don't have rain followed by sunshine followed by more rain, so when it stopped raining, I thought that was the end of it. It wasn't. When I looked up at the sky, I saw some gigantic clouds. You know the puffy cumulus kind that float by on a sunny afternoon? Well, these clouds were similar to those, only about 20 times larger. These were cumulonimbus clouds - the most dangerous type of cloud. And they were heading my way. Not long after I went back inside, it started getting dark. Rain began to fall, followed by hail. Lightning flashed again and again as the hail pelted against the windows. I heard that there were 3 tornado warnings. When I looked outside, I couldn't see very far at all, so a tornado could come and I might not even notice until it tore the roof off. I got excited, and started watching very careful...