16 Questions About Earth’s Atmosphere and Weather Answered: Quick Facts

Written and fact-checked by

The Information Architects of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Photos

Lightning over Oradea, Romania

A large tornado touches down in a grassy field under dark clouds, with a National Severe Storms Laboratory field command vehicle parked on the roadside in the foreground.

Illustration showing ten cloud types at different altitudes above the ground: cirrus, cirrocumulus, and cirrostratus at high elevations; altocumulus and altostratus at mid-levels; nimbostratus, stratocumulus, stratus, cumulus, and the towering cumulonimbus clouds at lower to very high elevations, with a plane for scale.

Contrail of a four-engined jet airliner

Two-part diagram explaining how to estimate lightning distance by timing thunder, and how thunder is heard differently based on location. The top section shows sound waves from a lightning flash reaching an observer, with a scale indicating that thunder is heard about three seconds after the flash for each kilometer, or five seconds for each mile, up to five kilometers or three miles. The bottom section depicts two people in cars at different distances from the main lightning channel and a branc

Satellite view of Hurricane Hugo, showing a large, swirling white cloud mass with a distinct eye approaching the South Carolina coast near Charleston.

See All Images →

Topics

Atmosphere Weather Weather forecasting Ionosphere and magnetosphere weather modification Fog Humidity Ozone layer Cloud Frost Temperature inversion Kármán line