Hotshots
Shortlisted images f rom the Royal Meteorological Society Weather Photographer of the Year 2021 competition
Stavros Kesedakis
‘Pancake Lenticulars’ Stavros Kesedakis, Greece
Almost every May, Stavros takes a trip to the USA to chase storms. On this particular day, he and his friend were following a supercell storm that couldn’t quite get its act together and produce a tornado. They were debating if they should keep following the storm when they noticed that it was forming two beautifully shaped clouds. It reminded Stavros of the smooth, laminar appearance of lenticular clouds.
While not strictly true lenticular clouds, such structures do form around thunderstorms when stable air is forced to rise, for example by a storm’s cold air outflow or via dynamic lifting by a strong updraft above. However, they could also potentially be low-precipitation supercell updrafts. Without knowing quite how these structures evolved, it’s difficult to say for sure what they are, apart from the fact they are the visible manifestation of stable, moist air being forced to rise.