Cloud investigation by satellite /

Scorer (senior research fellow in mathematics and environmental technology, University of London, and author of Environmental Aerodynamics, CH, Jul '78), provides an interesting and useful book for readers who are engaged in the study and interpretation of meteorologic satellite images. A few introductory chapters cover the technical detail of the various meteorological satellites, and give explanations needed for interpretation of the images. The rest of the book consists of extensively captioned pictures taken from the satellites showing many types of atmospheric events. The frequently lengthy captions provide much instruction on the interpretation of the images. This appears to be the only book of its scope presently available in the literature. There is an index keyed to photo numbers but, oddly, the book has no page numbers. The most noticeable shortcoming is that there are only five references in the entire volume, which greatly limits its utility as a reference source. Even though Scorer provides short explanations of some of the atmospheric phenomena presented, a background in atmospheric science is assumed. This would make the book most suitable for upper-division undergraduate or graduate students.-R.M. McCoy, University of Utah