Once clouds have collected moisture through evaporation, how far do they usually travel before raining?

Question

I'm particularly after some general information about the area rain would likely to fall given evaporation from an inland lake.

Answer 1

It is not a matter of travelling, it depends on how much moisture they have collected. Once the cloud gets too "heavy" to hold the moisture, condensation occurs and it rains.

Answer 2

Clouds form in rising air when the water vapour condenses into minute water droplets. If the cloud is big enough, the tops freeze and ice crystals occur in the cloud. These trigger coalescence of the water droplets into larger droplets which eventually become too heavy and fall as rain.

Just because water evaporates from a lake does not mean cloud will form. You need the air to be unstable or forced to rise so that the cloud will get some depth. Individual clouds do not have a very long life but clouds are constantly forming and dissipating so the cloud mass can continue for some time.

It really depends on the type of cloud and the weather system producing it to determine how far the cloud will travel. Clouds are steered by the wind and the winds around 15,000ft will give you a reasonable idea of the direction they will take.

Answer 3

how far they traveled depends largely on the amount of moisture in them and the energy needed for saturation to be attained. they shed their contents immediately after then. also the environmental moisture content too is very significant. if the environment is relativeley drier it may cause evaporation from the cloud and it dissolves without shedding water! the velocity of the prevailing driving wind to plays a role.

Answer 4

Its not distance, but temperature and atmospheric pressure.
Temperature can cause rain by condensing the moisture until it is too heavy to remain aloft.
Low perss ure tends to help by allowing the moisture rich clouds approach closer to ground level where temperature can cause the rain.