Cwmwl Cyfartaledd - An Average Cloud?

“What is the weight of an average cloud?”

This brilliant question, that Mimms asked in the pub quiz at Ty’n Llan/Vaynol Arms (where i work), got me transfixed. What IS an average cloud? The idea that one could exist is intriguing. Have I ever seen one? Have you? What kind of average - mean, median, mode? (this being the only part of O’level maths i remember).

An average cloud (without specifying if mean, median or mode), according to Reading University and ‘The Weight of Stuff’ is 1km cubed. Mostly they are cumulus clouds (the sort you see on a summers day floating about like sheep, and that i painted around the top of my bedroom wall when i was 10). And apparently they weigh 250 tonnes or 2 blue whales (according to Reading Uni) or 600 tonnes or 100 6 tonne elephants (according to the Weight of Stuff). Obviously the weight is pretty tricky to calculate, but let’s say a lot. Probably more than the quiz answer, which was 10 tonnes. And my answer which was 0.

Apparently we should be asking about mass anyway.

But for me, I started to wonder whether an average cloud would need to be calculated for a particular place. Is an average cloud in Capel Curig/Dyffryn Mymbwr (highest rainfall in the UK) different to an average cloud in say Essex (desert like)? Maybe these are changing over time as the climate heats up?

We are always seeking the exceptional, the rare, the endangered. Storm chasers come to mind.

What if we sought the average, the unexceptional, the vernacular of a cloud in a particular place?

Mark Cocker quote.