New! Sign up for our free email newsletter.
Reference Terms
from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fog

Fog is a cloud in contact with the ground. Fog differs from other clouds only in that fog touches the surface of the Earth. The same cloud that is not fog on lower ground may be fog where it contacts higher ground such as hilltops or mountain ridges.

The foggiest place in the world is the Grand Banks off the island of Newfoundland, Canada. Fog is frequent here as the Grand Banks is the meeting place of the cold Labrador Current from the north and the much warmer Gulf Stream from the south. The foggiest land areas in the world are Point Reyes, California and Argentia, Newfoundland, both with over 200 foggy days a year. Most types of fog form when the relative humidity reaches 100% at ground-level. Fog can form suddenly, and can dissipate just as rapidly, depending what side of the dewpoint the temperature is on.

Related Stories
 


Earth & Climate News

August 8, 2026

Glyphosate was long thought to be safe for honeybees because they lack the enzyme the chemical targets in weeds. However, researchers found that exposed bees foraged 13 percent less after only three days and showed changes in brain chemicals linked ...
Ancient seafloor sediments have revealed a surprising twist in how the Atlantic’s massive circulation system works. During a cold period about 3.4 million years ago, the flow of warm, salty water ...
Historic wildfires scorched huge areas of Spain and France, with one Spanish blaze burning an area about the size of New York City and a French fire generating a rare, towering fire cloud. A dangerous combination of lush winter growth, severe heat, ...
Animal bones preserved in South Australia’s underwater caves reveal distinctive clues shaped by darkness, algae, bacteria, and other environmental conditions. The findings give scientists a powerful new way to reconstruct how ancient megafauna ...
Thawing Arctic permafrost is releasing ancient carbon into the ocean, raising fears that microbes could turn it into greenhouse gases and accelerate climate change. But sediment cores collected near ...
An AI analysis of 1.2 million satellite images shows that floating algae blooms are spreading across the global ocean. The rapid growth of massive seaweed mats could reshape marine habitats while bringing foul-smelling decay, ecological damage, and ...
Coastal communities are facing a hidden threat that is making rising seas far more dangerous: the land beneath them is sinking. New research shows that people in densely populated coastal regions experience an average relative sea-level rise of ...
Global warming appears to have shifted into a faster gear. After removing the effects of El Niño, volcanic eruptions, and solar cycles, researchers found that the planet has warmed at roughly 0.35°C per decade over the past ten years, compared ...
Scientists discovered unusually high water-vapor supersaturation inside deep tropical clouds, creating conditions in which tiny aerosol particles could intensify storm updrafts. The finding suggests earlier studies may have missed the effect because ...
A new chemical process can transform three of the most common plastics into high-purity hydrogen without sorting them first. The technique operates at much lower temperatures than traditional ...
Songbirds appear to have evolved through rare explosions of change separated by long periods of slower development. Many of those bursts lined up with major climate shifts, suggesting that environmental upheaval can reshape life in powerful ...
Bumblebees naturally have short lives, but extreme heat and human activity are making survival harder. Pesticides can poison bees or destroy the flowers they depend on, while habitat loss leaves them with fewer safe places to live and feed. ...

Latest Headlines

updated 12:56 pm ET