Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Yellowstone Burning


Large wildfires burning in Yellowstone as Globably Warming continues unabated. God save us "Cap and Trade Bill" (Which will double everyone's electric bill)!!!! -HLG

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

TS "KETSANA" One of Four in WPAC


West Pac got very active this past weekend. Ketsana is fading now over Indochina, but there are three other active TC's in the WPAC. Is the Atlantic Season over? Kind of like the Bills in the NFL, after the anihilation by the Mighty Saints??? - HLG

Autumn has Arrived. Ahhh! Good to be Alive!

Latest obs at Reagan National! Sick Day! - HLG


Time
EDT (UTC) Temperature
F (C) Dew Point
F (C) Pressure
Inches (hPa) Wind
MPH Weather
Latest Noon (16) Sep 29 68.0 (20.0) 41.0 (5.0) 29.72 (1006) WSW 16
11 AM (15) Sep 29 66.9 (19.4) 39.0 (3.9) 29.72 (1006) WSW 12
10 AM (14) Sep 29 63.0 (17.2) 41.0 (5.0) 29.72 (1006) W 12
9 AM (13) Sep 29 59.0 (15.0) 42.1 (5.6) 29.72 (1006) W 10
8 AM (12) Sep 29 57.9 (14.4) 41.0 (5.0) 29.71 (1006) W 7

Friday, September 25, 2009

Australian Dust Storm Heads for New Zealand


The giant dust-cloud which cause a freakish scene on Australia's East Coast got entrained in a large polar-low, and was heading towards New Zealand in this MODIS image from yesterday. - HLG

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Saharan "Class" Dust Storm in Eastern Australia


They had to close Sydney International briefly at the densest part of the storm passed. The Sahara would be proud of this storm! - HLG

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

TRMM Measures Widespread Heavy SE USA Rains


TRMM shows many large blobs (technical term) of areas receiving over 300 mm of rain, which is stronly suspected to be a factor in recent flooding. HLG

Global Warming Floods SE USA!

Deadly Flooding Rakes Communities Across Southeast
by The Associated Press

Enlarge Curtis Compton/Atlanta Journal-Constitution/APA female motorist abandons her flooded vehicle on I-85 South near Lilburn, Ga., as part of the highway becomes covered with water during rush hour Monday.

Curtis Compton/Atlanta Journal-Constitution/APA female motorist abandons her flooded vehicle on I-85 South near Lilburn, Ga., as part of the highway becomes covered with water during rush hour Monday.

text sizeAAASeptember 22, 2009
Docile creeks turned into surging rivers and rivers into raging floodwaters as storms raking the Southeast for days dropped up to 20 inches of rain, killing at least six people and leaving communities under water.

"Any rain that fell has no place to go," said Georgia climatologist David Stooksbury said Monday. "This rainfall on top of already saturated soils really made the situation worse."

Enlarge John Bazemore/APFlooding washed out a bridge in Douglasville, Ga. Heavy rain swamped areas in and around Atlanta.

John Bazemore/APFlooding washed out a bridge in Douglasville, Ga. Heavy rain swamped areas in and around Atlanta.
Floodwaters ripped apart a west Georgia trailer home, drowning a 2-year-old boy swept from his father's arms. In Atlanta, stranded motorists scrambled to the tops of their car as waters rose on one of the city's busiest highways. To the north, crews worked to shore up a levee holding a surging river back from an isolated town.

Aerial shots showed schools, football fields, even entire neighborhoods submerged by the deluge, sending some unlucky residents scurrying for higher ground.

Enlarge Curtis Compton/Atlanta Journal-Constitution/APDakota Nelson (left) and Levi Wright move a barricade to higher ground after flood waters from the Yellow River continued to rise Monday in Lilburn, Ga.

Curtis Compton/Atlanta Journal-Constitution/APDakota Nelson (left) and Levi Wright move a barricade to higher ground after flood waters from the Yellow River continued to rise Monday in Lilburn, Ga.
"It's a mess all over," said Lisa Janak of the Georgia Emergency Management Agency.

As the storm front rumbled through west Georgia, it turned a normally sleepy creek into a surging headwater that tore apart 2-year-old Preston Slade Crawford's mobile home around 2 a.m. The body of the drowned boy nicknamed "Scooter" wasn't found until hours later. His parents had been rescued from the raging waters as another son, Cooper, age 1, clung to his mother's arms in Carroll County, west of Atlanta.

Pat Crawford, the boy's grandmother, watched helplessly as the family's mobile home was whisked away.

"Y'all gotta help us! Y'all gotta save us!" Crawford remembers Bridgett Lawrence and Craig Crawford shouting above the roaring water. She said she was on higher ground, but couldn't get to them because the current was so bad.

At least two people were missing, including a Tennessee man who went swimming in an overflowing ditch on a $5 dare and a 15-year-old Georgia teen who never returned from a swim in the surging Chattooga River. About 12,000 Georgia Power customers were without power late Monday.

Some areas of the state have had 20 inches since Friday. In the northern section, areas have experienced "historic" amounts of rain well in excess of so-called 100-year predictions, which describe a storm with the likelihood of happening once every century, said Stooksbury. The downpours come just months after much of the region emerged from an epic two-year drought.

Crews in the tiny Georgia town of Trion worked to shore up a levee breached by the Chattooga River and in danger of failing. The town evacuated more than 1,500 residents, and Red Cross workers set up an emergency shelter.

Most of the dead were motorists trying to navigate the treacherous roadways.

The surging waters weren't just dangerous for drivers. A 22-year-old Alabama man, James Dale Leigh, drowned when a pond's rain-soaked bank collapsed beneath him, said Etowah County Sheriff Todd Entrekin.

Emergency officials were often forced to improvise to rescue dozens of people stranded in their homes and cars.

"We're using everything we can get our hands on," Douglas County spokesman Wes Tallon said. "Everything from boats to Jet Skis to ropes to ladders."

Other southeastern states were hit less severely.

In Kentucky, rescue crews went on more than a dozen runs to help stranded people after 4 inches of rain fell on parts of Louisville on Sunday, said city fire department spokesman Sgt. Salvador Melendez.

Water rose as high as window-level on some houses in North Carolina's Polk County, forcing emergency officials to evacuate homes along a seven-mile stretch of road. Flooding in more than 20 counties in western North Carolina closed roads, delayed school and forced evacuations.

The forecast held little good news for Georgia: Another round of storms was expected to move in Tuesday from the west.

"Don't remind me," Carroll County Emergency Management Director Tim Padgett said of the forecast. "That's the worst news we could hear."

Friday, September 18, 2009

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Finds Serious Cold on Moon


The LRO has reported back with its mapping radiometer that the permanently shadowed craters of the lunaar south pole, where ice is hoped to be discovered, has permanent temperatures as cold as any in the solar system, of aroun 40 K, or below -350 degrees F. Yow! - HLG

TD "7" or MPTCF?


The NHC has upped this area an official Medium Probability of Tropical Cyclone Formation. Looks like a TD to me with the convection firing up today. You decide! - HLG

TR "FRED"


Tropical Remnant "FRED" still plugging it's way across the Atlantic, and has the Eastern Seaboard in site! - HLG

Thursday, September 17, 2009

"CHOI-Wan" from TRMM


Good thing this one will stay out at sea! - HLG

Fires, Typhoons, and TDs




Some nice images of the fire burn-scars in SoCal, the latest MODIS on Super-Typhoon Choi-Wan (which should miss Japan), and a broad surface circ, which has a little confection, in the eastern Atlantic. -HLG

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Super-Typhoon Choi-Wan!


It has been a sparse year for super-typhoons, but we have one now. "CHOI-WAN"! - HLG

Friday, September 11, 2009

"Linda" and "Fred" Wind Fields




Very nice hyprid images of Quikscat windfields, including flags, and gridded pretty-colors.

Finally, a very nice TRMM pass over Istanbul, where they had a few hundred milimeters of rainfall, which caused numerous drownings, and washed hundreds of cars into the sea. - HLG

Classic Hurricane Profile of "Fred" from Quikscat


"Fred" from Quikscat on 9-11-9. -HLG

"Fred" going to head west again?



Looks like the models are starting to turn "Fred" to the west again. What is the consensus? Fish-storm, or threat to lands in the west?

I completely agree with Dr BB. Count me in. No more fat men on the Weather Channel. The new name will be Hot Babes Give the Weather Channel!!!

Finally, we did score a victory yesterday. As the tropical rainfalls inundate the Mid-Atlantic today, we finally got a LPTF circle added to the storm on the east coast! Go FWSAAB!!! = HLG

FWSAAB TO BID ON WC

Breaking news. FWSAAB News Agency reports that the FWSAAB gang will make a substantial bid to take over the "Weather Channel" - which, since their recent purchase by NBC, has become the "Al Roker Channel."

"I turned on the 'Weather Channel' yesterday morning and saw some guy named "Al" give a business report on GM and then a financial section on gold. What the hell?" say's Plank Owner BB. "Where's my weather? Where's my T&A?"

A takeover bid by real meteorologists/oceanographers/geologists is expected in the next few weeks. Stay tuned fellow fans.

BB

Thursday, September 10, 2009

LPTCF 8?


Sure is windy out there. Looks like the big CBs are very near the center of this circulation, and the upper levels are undecided at worst. - HLG

Can we get a LPTCF?


There was a "low probability" of tropical cyclone formation for this system over the weekend, but it was dropped. Looks like it could be a TD now. What say the FWSAAB? - HLG

Beautyshot of Major Hurricane "Fred"


Glad this one is a true Fish Storm. - HLG

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Indian Ocean "Key" to Tropical Medium-Range Forecasts?

Mysterious Weather Pulses Help Predict Hurricanes

Michael Reilly, Discovery News
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Better Predictions | Discovery News Video Aug. 31, 2009 -- Every month or so, a wave of mysterious weather pops up over the Indian Ocean and begins marching eastward through the tropics.

Scientists are unsure what causes it, but a new study has shown that tracking these pulses -- known as the Madden Julian Oscillation -- could allow weather forecasters to predict hurricane and tropical storm formation up to three weeks ahead of time.

Forecasters know enough about the conditions that produce these vicious storms to make annual guesses about how active each hurricane season might be, and to forecast their behavior about five days into the future once they form.

But in between is a vast chasm of uncertainty.

Frederic Vitart of the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts in the United Kingdom is beginning to bridge that gap, by shedding light on the way the Oscillation influences tropical storm formation, intensity and movement.

Alternating between a vast province of moist, stormy air or an unusually dry patch, the Oscillation slowly blows through the tropics, often circling the globe several times. In a computer simulation of the last 20 years of hurricane seasons, Vitart showed it could increase or decrease risk that a storm would make landfall by as much as 50 percent.

The results were published earlier this month in the journal Geophysical Research

"The Madden Julian Oscillation creates large-scale conditions which are known to favor tropical storm genesis," he said, bringing with it increased moisture and weakening wind shear.

Vitart's model reliably predicts storm formation out to about 20 days. But the Oscillation is a diffuse, widespread weather pattern; using it to forecast hurricanes can dramatically improve forecasts, but it does not turn weather models into crystal balls.

Even armed with knowledge of the Oscillation's influence on Hurricane Katrina, for instance, no one could have foreseen the storm's devastating strike on New Orleans.

"We may not be able to predict the strike of a storm at a given time and given location, but we can predict if the probability of a tropical storm strike will increase or decrease in the next few weeks over a large area," Vitart said.

"I think that the forecasting that would arise from the Madden Julian Oscillation would be different in nature from the three- and five-day operational track forecasts that currently come out of the National Hurricane Center, which predict the track (and cone of uncertainty) of a storm that already exists," Gabriel Vecchi of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Princeton, New Jersey said in an email to Discovery News.

"The Madden Julian Oscillation would help us to predict the genesis of a storm that doesn't exist yet, and the likely character of its track, landfall, etc."

Vitart added that he is working on developing a way to use this type of forecasting to construct maps that display advanced warning of increased risk of hurricane strikes for a given stretch of islands or coastline.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

TS "Fred" in Quikscat


"Fred" has a lot of 50s in the windfield. Very strong TS, good thing it is going to swim with the fishes! -HLG

Hurriance Season 2009 Effectively Over?

Well we do have the thrilling spectacle of TS "Fred" churning up the fishes in the Eastern Atlantic, but it is starting to appear that the season is rapidly winding down, what little it was.

Of cours we had "Erika". GG won the competition with her presient call of a "Fish Storm", which was closest to the out-come with that bizaaro storm-that-never-developed. Of course Dr BB's outrageously bold call of a Cat 5 hitting NYC never happened, thank goodness. All those years wasted in college. The overly-optimistic call of a minimal storm hitting Florida, by HLG, was nearly as comical! -HLG

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Thick Smoke Over LA Basin


Fire smoke is heavy, and lingering over LA and the San Fernando Valley, plus adrift offshore. - HLG

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Hi-Res Quikscat Winfds of "Erika"


Very nice Quikscat pass over "Erika" this morning. Lots of 50s (kts) in the rain-contaminated flags, but NHC still has storm under 40 kts. Hmmm. -HLG

Fires Threaten Mt Wilson


The big fires in souther California are threatening the historic Mt Wilson Observatory, where Hubble disovered the first direct evidence for the Big Bang. - HLG

TS "Erika" Prediction Times


OK Gang.

The models are showing a widespread with the future track of "Erika". This is like a horse-race with no clear favorite, but we still haven't opened Exacta wagering on this one. However, you get to pick ont of three choices on the future of "Erika".

A) Gulf Coast Somewhere

B) East Coast Somewhere

C) Fish Storm

We will call it a tie with A & B if she hits Florida. - HLG

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

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