Hello sorry if this is the wrong thread:

Well I have been outside most of the night running errands, and recently went to smoke a cigarette, and the whole evening I noticed that the clouds and wind was running a east to west motion. I live in Memphis Tennessee and usually the weather comes from Arkansas and holds a steady west to east motion, so tonight I decided to check the radar and I came across these images from the radar in the city.

First I checked my usual site source



and then I checked a second one to verify



I am not sure if this is normal, however I do check the weather from time to time and I have never spotted this type of weather pattern unless it was a tornado of some kind. Just looking for an educated answer, I don't believe it is something heinous just maybe a software style I have never seen.

Thats normal. It has something to do with the city, some cities can affect the weather. It was explained to me one time because I always see that over the city of Cleveland when I check the radar.

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The pattern shown there may have something to do with where the radar is located,example, if the radar is located on top of a hill and the rain is at that same height it will create what is called noise

this looks like the cloud was right at the radar level and only heavier rain was able to penetrate the radar noise and show itself

I believe that is what Meteorologists term 'ground clutter'.

From Wiki:

"...Clutter (also termed ground clutter) is a form of radar signal contamination. It occurs when fixed objects close to the transmitter—such as buildings, trees, or terrain (hills, ocean swells and waves)—obstruct a radar beam and produce echoes. The echoes resulting from ground clutter may be large in both areal size and intensity. The effects of ground clutter fall off as range increases usually due to the curvature of the earth and the tilt of the antenna above the horizon. Without special processing techniques, targets can be lost in returns from terrain on land or waves at sea.

Clutter is used by the military to jam radars by the use chaff. Chaff is small reflective material used to hide troop, ship, or aircraft movements by creating many returns and overwhelming the radar's receiver with spurious targets"

~TCT~

I live in Indiana and use to live in Kentucky, just as in Tenn our systems and wind usually go from west to east, I have known of it changing but not often. If I recall it was usually when a strong weather pattern was on the east coast pushing against anything coming in from the west.

Ground clutter on the radar use to confuse me until I realized it looks different than actual rain.