STRANGE UFO CLOUD SPOTTED AT SAME SPOT EACH TIME OVER THE SOUTH ISLAND OF NEW ZEALAND

The antagonist of the 2022 horror film Nope was a unique one: an extraterrestrial being dressed as a motionless cloud. It turns out that UFO-shaped stationary clouds do exist in the real world, despite the fact that the movie is a work of fiction. A formation that has been unsettling the people of New Zealand's South Island for nearly a century was photographed by NASA's Earth Observatory. Despite being unusual, its peculiar behaviour appears to have a scientific explanation.

Often spotted in the skies around Middlemarch, Otago, this unusual cloud is known as the "Taieri Pet." The elongated altocumulus standing lenticular cloud (ASLC) is the official name for this "pet cloud." On September 7, NASA's Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 captured a satellite image of it during its most recent sighting.

The image shows it as a fluffy, white oblong shape. Witnesses on the ground and in the air (from a side view, rather than NASA's aerial view) have characterized it as a stationary “huge stack of pancakes” or a “pile of plates” that remains in the same location, according to the Earth Observatory.

There is a reason why these clouds appear and act in this way, despite their menacing appearance. According to NASA's Earth Observatory, "lenticular clouds form when prevailing winds encounter a topographic barrier, such as a mountain range." The atmosphere forms a sort of wave when wind is compelled to flow up and over the mountains. The water vapour in the air condenses into clouds as it cools at the wave's crest. On the other hand, warming and evaporation result from falling air.

Strong winds from the northwest of the island pour over the Rock and Pillar Range, which is distinguished by its steep sides and flat top, running nearly perpendicular to the prevailing winds, according to meteorologist John Law of New Zealand's MetService. "The cloud is shaped by the strong winds blowing through it and stays nearly motionless in the sky as it forms on the crest of this wave," Law continues.

ASLCs like the "Taieri Pet" can pose a risk to aviation because of their height. Because of their exceptionally low temperatures, ice also forms on airplanes, and if an aircraft passes through a cloud, it may encounter extreme turbulence because of vertical currents that flow up and down through the cloud. "Pet clouds" could unleash a range of climatic conditions and serve as a warning to people on the ground about severe weather conditions in the atmosphere. NASA's Earth Observatory comes to the conclusion that "lenticulars can signal that precipitation is on the way in certain settings."