Word: layering
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...Ghosts. He did not have far to look. During World War II, Menzel had left astronomy to become a radar expert. One job (as chairman of the Wave Propagation Committee of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) was to study the effect of atmospheric irregularities on radar waves. Sometimes a layer of warm air makes the waves wander oddly, producing deceptive ghosts on the radarscope. Warships have shelled empty ocean, thinking an enemy was there. Since light waves and radar waves behave in much the same way, Menzel reasoned that the same irregularities might produce optical ghosts resembling flying saucers...
Some optical ghosts are common: the ordinary mirages which nearly everyone has seen. Commonest of all is "water-in-the-road," which is caused by a thin layer of warm air above sun-heated pavement. The two layers (cold and dense above, hot and less dense below) "refract"* upward the light that reaches them from the distant sky. A motorist sees shining water (really sky) lying in the road. In hot deserts this sort of mirage is extremely deceptive...
...sighting" and sent it to the Air Force. He never thought his disks were flying saucers; they were close to the moon and obviously associated with it. But they puzzled him for a long time. Now he believes they were caused by the motion of the car distorting a layer of warm air just above its roof and forming two displaced images of the rising moon. A more ignorant man might well have reported them as flying objects. At any rate, they led Menzel to his present theory about the saucers...
...major factor in Kentucky's pre-eminence in breeding thoroughbreds is the quick-growing, perennial bluegrass. Under lying this valuable feed crop is a layer of rare old limestone, which supplies phosphorus and calcium for the building of sturdy bones, elastic muscles and strong tendons...
...legal in England) were grabbing up money hand over fist as they sang out the fast-changing odds. Suddenly, clambering over the rocky ground, a man appeared, dragging a foul-smelling concoction known as chemerly (rags soaked in a blend of aniseed, turpentine and urine). He was the trail-layer, the man who sets the grueling ten-mile course over rock, moor and bracken. The starter dropped his hand and the yelping hounds were...