Teide dawns crowned with a hooded cloud and another lenticular

The State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) has shared this Saturday the “wonderful image” captured at dawn at the centenary Izaña observatory, on the island of Tenerife. In it, El Teide appears with a “hooded cloud” crowning the peak and, just above, an “incipient lenticular cloud”.

According to the International Cloud Atlas of the World Meteorological Organization, when an air current crosses an orographic obstacle it can generate “mountain waves on the lee slope (the opposite side to where the wind comes from), depending on the atmospheric conditions and the topography features.

Sometimes, due to the oscillations produced by the air on the leeward slope, lenticular clouds form on the crests of these waves, “which indicates that there is an alteration of the current due to the relief.”

Hooded clouds cover the top of the mountain. When viewed from the leeward slope they indicate “there is probably downstream wave activity.”