lithometeor

{{Short description|Type of meteor}}

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File:Lithometeor.Sonnenuntergang.Saharastaub.P1024931.jpg in Berlin on February 25, 2021, cloudless sky with Saharan dust.]]

Lithometeors are meteors that are observed in the atmosphere on the earth's surface or in the sky in the field of meteorology.{{Cite book |editor=Weather Bureau - United States Department of Commerce |url=https://www.google.de/books/edition/WBAN_Manual_of_Surface_Observations/za8bAAAAMAAJ?hl=de&gbpv=1&pg=PA24&printsec=frontcover |title=WBAN Manual of Surface Observations |chapter=3600. Lithometeors |page=24 |date=1949 |publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office |language=en}} The name is derived from “litho”, ancient Greek {{lang|grc|λίθος}} [{{lang|grc-latn|líthos}}] for “stone” (note: including in the sense of sand and dust), and “meteor”, from ancient Greek {{lang|grc|μετέωρος}} [metéōros], “floating in the air”. Unlike electrometeors, hydrometeors and photometeors, they are associated with suspended particles that are not made of water.{{Cite book |editor=United States Weather Bureau Data Acquisition |url=https://www.google.de/books/edition/Substation_Observations/eGOGQzc0QVIC?hl=de&gbpv=1&pg=PA71&printsec=frontcover |title=Substation Observations | chapter=6 Lithometeors |page=71 |date=1970 |publisher=The Bureau |language=en}} Solid and liquid components of the atmosphere in whose composition water plays no or at least almost no role are also referred to as aerosols.{{Cite book |editor=Institute of Science and Technology |title=Proceedings of theInternational Symposium on Remote Sensing of Environment |volume=23 |issue=1 |page=406 |date=1990 |publisher=Infrared and Optics Laboratory, Institute of Science and Technology, the University of Michigan |language=en}}

The following phenomena are lithometeors:[https://cloudatlas.wmo.int/en/lithometeors.html Table 16. Classification of lithometeors], World Meteorological Organization, retrieved March, 17 2025

• Ash cloud
• Smoke
• Micrometeorites
• Dust storm
• Haze
• Tornado