Atmospheric
Stability
Stability
The rate at which the actual air temperature decreases with increasing height above the surface is referred to as the ____ rate.
environmental lapse rate
A typical raindrop is about ____ times larger than a typical cloud droplet.
100
Lines connecting points of equal pressure are called
isobars
A seasonal reversal of the wind (onshore during the summer, offshore during the winter) is known as the ____________.
monsoon
In the Northern Hemisphere, the subtropical jet is to the _____ the polar front jet.
south
A rising unsaturated air parcel cools at the
dry adiabatic lapse rate
A ____________________ cloud droplet is a liquid droplet observed at temperatures below 0°C (32°F).
supercooled
Horizontal pressure variations cause air to move from areas of __________ pressure to areas of __________ pressure.
High to Low
The land/sea breeze, lake breeze, and mountain/valley breeze are examples of
thermal circulations
The majority of the United States, and the midlatitudes in general, lies within the wind belt known as the
westerlies
The difference between "moist" and "dry" adiabatic rates is due to the fact that ________________ is released by a rising parcel of saturated air.
latent heat
During the ________________ process of rain formation,ice crystals grow larger at the expense of the surrounding liquid cloud droplets.
Bergeron Ice Crystal
The wind around a surface high pressure center in the Northern Hemisphere blows _____________ around the center.
clockwise
A wind direction reported as 90° would be a wind blowing from the:
East
In the three-cell model, the surface wind belt observed on the poleward side of the polar front is called the
polar easterlies
The elevation where the cloud base forms is called the ____ level.
condensation
What is the most common ice crystal shape?
Dendrite
Isobaric surfaces are ______________ in warm, less-dense air and ________________ in cold, more-dense air.
higher; lower
The wind’s speed generally increases with height above Earth’s surface because it does not feel the effects of _______________.
friction
The large thermally driven convection cell that is driven by heating in the tropics along the ITCZ is the _____________ cell.
Hadley
What are the 4 lifting mechanisms?
convection, orographic lift, frontal boundaries, convergence
What is the precipitation type?
Snow falls into a shallow above freezing layer of air before entering in to another freezing layer near the surface.
Ice Pellets
A geostrophic wind is a wind that results from a balance between the _______________ force and the ___________________ force.
Coriolis, PGF
When do thermally generated turbulent eddies typically peak?
Daytime; late afternoon
In the three-cell model of the atmosphere, winds at the top of the midlatitude Ferrel Cell winds are incorrectly predicted to flow from ____.
east