When waves form in the sky

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Oliver Thansan
Oliver Thansan
03 May 2023 Wednesday 10:48
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When waves form in the sky

* The author is part of the community of readers of La Vanguardia

The sky of Fuengirola, in Malaga, has been filled with waves, as if the Mediterranean had risen with the intention of projecting its beauty onto us even more.

Actually, this phenomenon has a name. These are the Kelvin-Helmholtz clouds, which we can observe in this series of snapshots in Las Fotos de los Lectores de La Vanguardia.

These rare and beautiful clouds, which were a source of inspiration for the painter Van Gogh, appear when the layer below is denser or has a lower speed than the one above. They form on very windy days.

As the name suggests, Kelvin–Helmholtz clouds are due to Lord Kelvin and Hermann von Helmholtz, who, at the end of the 19th century, developed a theory to explain the origin of solar energy.

Thanks to them, the concept of Kelvin-Helmholtz instability is known, which is visually transported in this spectacular meteorological phenomenon with clouds that look like waves in the sky.