A rare phenomenon in the sky surprised residents of Aktau

Images captured in Aktau, Kazakhstan, have gone viral. Local residents were surprised by unusually shaped clouds, as reported by tengrinews.kz.

It turns out that the phenomenon in the video is roll clouds (volutus).

"This is an elongated, usually low-lying horizontal cloud mass in the shape of a tube, which creates the illusion of rotating around its own axis. Roll clouds are solitons, not connected to other clouds, and are an example of wave disturbance in the Earth's atmosphere. Such clouds form as a result of cold air outflow from cold fronts," said the press service of "Kazhydromet".

It is also specified that roll clouds are an extremely rare and one of the most unusual phenomena among cloud formations. "Under the influence of a downward flow from approaching air masses, humid air moves upward, cools, and forms a cylindrical cloud," meteorologists explained.

"Kazhydromet" also confirmed that this phenomenon was indeed observed on July 7 in Aktau.