English: Bright white cloud covered the Pacific Ocean and crept across the edge of the coast of Chile in late November 2017. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aboard NASA’s Aqua satellite acquired a true-color image of the cloud-filled scene on November 26.

Stratocumulus clouds have been defined as “low, lumpy, and gray” clouds which may produce drizzling rain. Derived from the Latin, the terms “stratus” means “layer” and “cumulus” means “heap” or “pile”, and the combined words well describe the often very large, low layers of puffy or lumpy clouds that can stretch for miles, often in non-uniform banks. When they form over open ocean, such clouds are known as “marine stratocumulus”.

Stratocumulus clouds form below 6,000 feet above sea level putting them in the category of “low cloud”. When “low cloud” drops to just above the ground, it earns the name “fog”. In this image, fog lies just offshore and pours over the arid western coast of Chile, with fingers projecting into the valleys of the foothills of the Andes Mountains. Must of the coast of southern Chile is extremely arid, with the moisture from fog providing the majority of the annual precipitation.