SkyPix

A digital photographic storybook of clouds, weather and water by Roger Edwards.

Stalactite Attack

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This portion of the main Carlsbad Cavern room offers the illusion that hundreds of needle-sharp teeth are pointed down and poised to chomp.   Instead, each stalactite is the collective residue of a single dripping seep, solidified from solution a drop at a time over many millennia.  Amidst them sits a bottle-shaped stalagmite that has grown into the ceiling. 4 W Whites City NM (9 Jun 14) … [Read more...]

Blue Hole of Haukadalur

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As with similar hot-spring pools in Yellowstone geothermal areas, heat-loving micro-organisms accentuate the natural blue hue of the mineral water, which is too torrid for human touch.  Such a stark and strange scene conveys the rawness of this Earth before human habitation, or perhaps, after the last of us is extinguished. Haukadalsvegur, Iceland (11 Aug 14) Looking SE 64.3138, -20.3016 … [Read more...]

Ice Toes

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This closeup shows the same ice toes as the three rightmost of the photo at left, but taken at a slightly different angle, 24 hours after I first visited these formations and under sunnier ambient light.  The clear water revealed the reddish clay bottom beneath the water's surface, while faintly reflecting the ice. Norman OK (26 Dec 9) Looking S 35.2142, -97.376 … [Read more...]

Ice Toe Row

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Ice toes are shoreline features formed when gentle, low-amplitude water waves ripple up and down a sufficiently cold surface, forming and then extending layers of ice with intervening gaps.  Such a process happens up to a point when the rate the ice washes or melts away roughly is offset by the new deposition.  They can take the shape of horizontal pedestals, or toe-shaped hanging forms such as … [Read more...]

Wrapping Barrel

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The legendary Bennington tornado got surrounded by thick curtains of rain on several occasions, remaining visible but nearly cloaking itself once from our perspective before a temporary unveiling again, followed by this mostly rain-shrouded, barrel-shaped appearance that embarked a protracted final stage of dense precipitation wrapping.  Sporadically the violent vortex became invisible, then at … [Read more...]

Foggy Mountain Sunset

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For just a fleeting moment, the setting sun peeked between stratocumulus clouds that were brushing the evergreen forests on Mount Rainier's flank.  The final sunlight of the day cast the conifers' silhouettes across intervening fog, turning an otherwise drab scene into a glimpse of sublime beauty. 1 SSW Paradise WA (15 Jul 11) Looking WNW 46.7735, -121.7444 … [Read more...]