Help Identifying

[Jeff Russell]

This picture was taken April 2nd in Rose Hill, MS @ 18:24z facing north-northeast. To me it looks like a non-rotataing wall cloud. Neither the lowering or the base was rotating. At the time the main SQLN was to our west about 10-15 miles. Any thoughts?

 

[Greg Higgins]

Wind shear

Greg Higgins

 

[Skip Talbot]

Looks like a small chunk of cumulus to me. It does share some similarities to what a wall cloud looks like including a lowered base and what appears to be a tail cloud. The tail cloud, however, is pointing in the wrong direction if you are facing north. There is also a lack of other discernable storm features such as a rain free base or rfd clear slot. There are other small cumulus in the background, which leads me to believe its just a more dramatic presentation of one of those. Such sights are common near squall lines, where a lot of low level clouds and scud get kicked up. And as Greg mentioned, low level wind shear, is going to sculp them into dramatic shapes.

 

[Brad Nelson]

Yeah, at first glance I would think that this was just condensation from scud rising into the base and then the wind shear twisting it around into some sort of funky looking shape. Plus, as pointed out, there is a clear slot present, unless it's directly behind the cloud and not viewable. But, there is a nice base on this and that makes me think that it certainly "could" be a messy wall cloud feature but I don't think I'd call it that for sure based on the image.

 

[Jason Boggs]

Just from a visual perspective, I wouldn't call this a wall cloud.

 

[Laura Duchesne]

Jack what way were the winds blowing? Was the air warm or cool? Almost screams "scud bomb" to me, but definitely not a wall cloud.

 

[Paul Austin]

I'm not sure I would even call this scud. With the squall line 15 miles away and probably very little convection directly ahead of it on 4/2, I'd describe this feature as more of a standard cumulus (almost congestus?) updraft that rises up into the leading edge of the squall line cloud deck. The cloud tops of these cells/line segments were sheared eastward across MS and half way across AL. I know, because I was chasing in AL and was quite disappointed to have my nice sunny sky over western AL covered over, limiting destabilization and killing what little hope existed for discrete cell development ahead of the line. As Skip mentioned, the strong wind shear on this day could have shaped and contorted any cloud passing vertically through the layers.