Breaking the clouds

Alejandro Selkirk Island, South Pacific Ocean

This small member of the Juan Fernandez Islands off the coast of Chile measure just under a mile across. But its 5,000 feet of elevation is high enough to reach the layer of stratocumulus clouds pictured above. The result is a type of flow known as a von Karmen vortex street. This striking, curly pattern of eddies can also be seen in clouds, and fluids or air moving past rounded objects such as an airplane wing. This image was taken by the Landsat 7 satellite in 1999.

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