These circular cloud formations on weather radar images are in fact caused by freak weather conditions disrupting radar antennae. The rings are only visible on radar screens and are caused when snow melts in the atmosphere and bounces back the radar signal.
That causes the white ring that stretches out to limit of the radar's range. The clear inside of the ring is dependent on the angle at which the radar aerial points at the sky.
The images only show up on radar screens for a split second because weather radars only emit a signal for seven seconds out of every hour.
Such RADAR returns are commonly caused by temperature inversion layers.
Last year when I made a query, the Broome Met Office kindly forwarded this
link to an ABC news story of 11 Nov 2010 which describes the phenomena - http://www.abc.net.au/local/photos/2...site=kimberley