Aw weeks ago I was driving home from the Weatherwise offices on one of the first really beautiful evenings of spring. The Sun was still up, and the cherry trees that lined the street were in full bloom; it was a welcome change from the gloomy gray skies of winter, and for once I did not mind the traffic. As I looked through my windshield at the long line of cars snaking up Wilson Boulevard, a streak of color in the sky ahead of me caught my attention: three cirrus clouds, each colored in a brilliant rainbow pattern, hung in the brilliant blue sky above the trees. The effect was spectacular, and I was thrilled to be witnessing what I suspected was (and later confirmed to be) a classic example-in triplicate, no less!-of a circumhorizontal arc. As is so often the case, I had left my house without a camera and could not document what I know was probably a once-in-a-lifetime photographic opportunity. Fortunately, there are others who are much more diligent about carrying photography equipment with them, and they have their cameras at the ready whenever Mother Nature puts on her spectacular shows. One of these people is Michael Mogil. In this issue of Weatherwise, Mogil takes readers to cruising altitude in "Cloud Watching from 35,000 Feet" to teach us about clouds and other optical phenomena from the top looking down with some amazing photographs and informative text. Not to be outdone, Jim Reed is one photographer who knows how to get in, get the shot, and get out. In "Storm Chaser: A Photographer's Journey," which is an excerpt of his book, Reed tells us how he got involved in capturing extreme weather through his lens and shows us that there is a heavy emotional toll to always being on the scene of devastation.
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