Cumulonimbus
The rarest of all clouds is the altocumulenticulostratonimbulocirruslenticulomammanoctilucent cloud, caused by an interaction between warm moist air, cool dry air, cold slippery air, cursed air, and a cloud of nanobots.
The rarest of all clouds is the altocumulenticulostratonimbulocirruslenticulomammanoctilucent cloud, caused by an interaction between warm moist air, cool dry air, cold slippery air, cursed air, and a cloud of nanobots.
This comic follows the naming of clouds. As with other lists (like in 1874, 2022, 2497, 2687 and 2954), it starts off as normal but then gets more unusual until it is unrealistic.
- Cumulus
- The first panel shows a cumulus cloud, from the Latin for "heap". These are common clouds and are relatively small. Cumulus clouds form when warm (and thus rising) moist air condenses when it hits the dew point, the temperature at which relative humidity hits 100%. Cumulus clouds with sharp, defined borders are still growing. When they stop growing (because the rising moist air is exhausted), they get fuzzy and fluffy, and eventually dissolve.
- Cumulo
nimbus - The second panel shows a cumulonimbus cloud, from the Latin for "heaping raincloud", with the upper part about the same size as the lower part. Though somewhat like the cumulus cloud, it is more prone to causing rain and lightning. Cumulonimbus clouds, like cumulus clouds, grow vertically because of their moist warm air, but they have enough energy to reach the top of the troposphere, giving them the distinctive anvil shape shown in the comic and their tendency to produce nasty weather.
- Cumulo
nimbulo nimbus - The third panel shows an even bigger cloud and names it cumulonimbulonimbus (Latin for "heaping rainy raincloud"). Here the scientific facts end and the humor begins. The cloud has the upper part about twice as large as the lower part. The humor here comes from building up an even bigger name by adding another "nimbus" element for the cloud as its size increases, suggesting that its growth as compared to the second cloud shown has made it even more "rainy".
- Cumulo
nimbulo nimbulo cumulo nimbus - The fourth panel shows an absurdly large cloud with three major layers and gives it the name cumulonimbulonimbulocumulonimbus (Latin for "heaping rainy rainy heaping raincloud"). This is a combination of the third and second cloud names in this comic, and indeed the fourth cloud looks a lot like the second one emerging out of the top of the third. This cloud may look like a super soaker, ready to spray water on everyone, or perhaps a faucet ready to open and pour water down.
- Alto
cumu lenticulo strato nimbulo cirrus lenticulo mamma noctilucent - The title text takes this comic to its logical extreme by naming a new cloud that has the longest name of them all and is also supposedly the rarest. Its name can be translated as "mid-altitude, heaped, lense-shaped, layered, grey, rainy, wispy, breast-like and lit at night". It mentions a common joke in weather communities, making fun of the common trope that thunderstorms form when "warm moist air" meets "cold dry air," an extreme oversimplification. A complicated cloud needs complicated processes, so Randall adds in "cold slippery air," then cursed air and nanobots, which makes the cloud impossible since neither of those exist.[citation needed]
- The name of this cloud is a compound of the following cloud names:
- altocumulus: "heap up high"; these clouds are mid-altitude white patches.
- lenticular cloud, often shaped like a flying saucer.
- stratus: a layered cloud, effectively above-ground fog.
- nimbus: a grey cloud producing continuous rain.
- cirrus: a cloud that looks like thin, wispy strands.
- "lenticulo" gets repeated, perhaps indicating that there's a second disc in the cloud.
- mammatus: a breast-like cloud structure that forms at the bottom of some thunderstorm clouds, which signifies sinking air and is associated with severe storm activity and, in the central United States, tornado formation.
- noctilucent: a cloud-like structure formed from ice crystals, often formed after volcano eruptions and other cataclysmic events and illuminated by a just-set sun.
The International Cloud Atlas defines the cloud types that are recognized by the WMO, the World Meteorological Organization. It was first published in 1896. Similarly, IUPAC publishes a manual that allows chemists to name chemical compounds in a consistent manner. The Altocumulenticulostratonimbulocirruslenticulomammanoctilucent may thus be a pun on IUPAC, which (theoretically) offers a unique name for each possible strand of DNA and other complex molecules (such as Titin). Therefore, Randall might have seen a unique cloud that has never been observed before, but yet, thanks to IUPAC-like cloud naming rules, he came up with a "valid" name for his observation.