Wayne Merritt age 9 of Macon GA :
What is fog?
Can a pail of water stop a giant ship? Yes.. it can. If that water is turned into fog it can blanket miles are miles of the ocean. The giant ship cannot see where to go. The sun is blotted out. On a foggy night the moon and stars are hidden from view. Nowadays a ship can use its radar to spot icebergs and other ships hidden in the fog. But not so long ago even the biggest liners were blinded by fog.
A fog is really a clouds. sitting on the ground or hovering over the sea. Like a clouds it is made of water. The water is in the form of droplets The droplets are so small then can float in the air. A thimble full of fog holds thousands of them millions of these droplets must get together to form a single raindrop of water big enough to falls A tumbler full of water sprayed into such fine droplets ‑‑an make miles of fog.
The fog is formed from water vapor in the air. The golden sun shines and warms up the land and the sea. They in turn warm the air above them. And the warm air becomes thirsty. It drinks up moisture from the lakes and rivers from the surface of the seal from puddles and from the damp laundry on the line. The air drinks up this moisture in the form of vapor. Vapor is a gas which mixes with the other gases in the air. We cannot see it. feel it or smell it.
As the air cools it becomes less thirsty. In facts it can no longer carry its load of water vapor. It must give it up. The vapor is squeezed out of the air into tiny, tiny droplets of water. Instead of invisible water vapor the air becomes full of misty fog.
Warm air tends to expand and rise. This makes it cooler. The load of water vapor is squeezed out aloft to form the 'high flying clouds. But sometimes the vapory air cools without rising aloft. Then its vapor turns into a mist or fog sitting on the ground or sea.
In some places a fog lasts for days at a time. But most fogs disappear after a few hours. Sometimes a high wind comes along and blows the lazy fog away.
More likely; the sun shines bright and warms up the air. The warmer air gets thirsty and soaks up the tiny droplets into vapor again.
Some fogs are so thick you cannot see your hand in front of your face. Where there is city smoke in the air: it often mixes with the droplets to forma pea soup fog. Such a thick lazy cloud may blot out the sun and turn day into night. A very light fog is called a haze. In a haze you may be able to see large objects half a mile away. Distant objects are blurred axed the sky above is softy pearly grey.
Above the fog or mist or haze. the sun is always shining. This is so even when fog turns to a light drizzle. For fog is made of cloud stuff. And no cloud can raise itself more than a few miles above the ground.. Overheads the golden sun is always waiting to break through and smile upon the earth.