Today is a prime example of why I hate snow!

 I sit here under gorgeous sunny skies and the temperature is 44 degrees. 44? Cool, right? Yes..of course it is. But with the sun and lack of wind, for November 30th, is really not that bad. In fact, with the sun on you it's pretty nice.

However, IF we had snow things would be far different.

Let's take a look at the latest satellite image, with a surface plot overlay (courtesy of NexLab/COD, http://weather.cod.edu/)

Click to enlarge

The arrows point to the main snow band, a result of snowfall from yesterday's storm. This fresh snow cover is limiting temperatures to the low/mid 30's today in the snow covered regions. In addition to the slushy mess that results from the melting snow, one would have to deal with temperatures at least 10 degrees cooler, if not more. And tonight? The snow will aid in substantial cooling, that we will not have to share.

The RUC model shows this well ...

Click to enlarge

The model is likely overdoing the extent of the cold air, but you get the idea. Naturally, this enhanced cooling tonight will serve to retard any large warmup tomorrow simply because the temperature will start from a far lower reading.

Understand, too, that this is a minor example of snow's effect. In the deeper winter, snow serves to aid in far more cloud cover, warm-ups that never make it, etc, etc. It doesn't only affect the highs today/tomorrow, it can allow temperatures to be colder for quite some time.

So I'll enjoy the "slushless" day, the roads without salt, and the ability for the sun to heat us to the maximum capacity. :)  Tomorrow (and beyond), any warm air that tries to make it here will not be impeded. Days like today remind me how much I'm thankful for that.

[Science reason, in very small detail: Sun shines with certain amount of energy. Any energy that goes to melting the snow (phase change) as well as energy that bounces back into space off the white snow subtracts from energy that could go to heating the air.]

Chicago Blizzard 1979

La Nina

 With massive drought across the south and fires, as seen by this satellite animation from CIMMS

From CIMMS -- might have to click to animate -- Satellite image of TX fires

 the last thing that is needed is another La Nina. (La Nina = cooler waters than normal off South American Coast and extending westward in the central Pacific whereas El Nino is the opposite. Maybe another image to explain the difference?

Image courtesy of NOAA

La Nina tends to -- and this is just typical trends and not set in stone for every season -- keep the south warmer and drier.  Winter brings windier conditions and as you can imagine, forecasts of  warm, dry, and windy are not good for a place already dealing by fires.  With that being said, this is just a general idea of what La Nina brings. I could do a 14 page rant on long range and seasonal forecasts. They are rarely very accurate. However, there are some historical trends that are noticeable during La Nina events. For those in drought and dealing with fires, the return of La Nina is the last thing you want to hear.

The latest analysis of Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) and the respective anomalies can be found at http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_update/sstanim.shtml .

Hurricane Irene

Since I last blogged, it became apparent via analysis that Irene would not hit Florida and it appeared to me, as I tweeted on Aug 23rd, that it would likely head northward, and either hit the outer banks of North Carolina or miss the US completely. The models continued to shift east (or to the right) every run. However, I didn't really look to see what Irene would do as it passed North Carolina. Even thought i looked at the 8 day GFS that showed it hitting NYC .... um .. hello Matt. :) So, yeah, now Irene is going northward towards the coast of NC or the outer banks and then will continue to move northward. Right now, the position of the ridge to the northeast of Irene leads one to believe that Irene will head for New England, but light southwesterly flow ahead of a trof in the US might steer it to sea. That appears unlikely, to me, but it wouldn't shock me. Once this thing picks up speed as it gets caught in the mid latitude "westerlies", it will begin to weaken. It already has failed to get to Cat-4 as once forecast by NHC. Shear is just a bit too much and a few eye-wall replacements didn't help matters. It is going over very warm waters so maybe a Cat-3 but then will weaken as it heads to NYC/New England. The Media, on the other hand, is forecasting pure Armageddon. They phrase it as "Irene, a major hurricane packing 115 mph winds is headed for NY". They don't say "but it will weaken considerably before then so won't be a major hurricane". Because the truth is no fun when you need ratings. And, to a point, I get that.
For more info, of course, head to http://www.nhc.noaa.gov
Here is the latest satellite animated gif, from the University of Wisconsin/CIMMS as well as some derived products.

Animated GIF: Click on the image to animate

Track of Irene: Click to enlarge

Satellite Derived Upper Level Winds: Click to enlarge

I thought about doing a rant on The Weather Channel, the Media, and so many meteorologists relying so heavily on the models. Never-mind that 3 days ago it was supposed to maul Florida via the models and that didn't pan out so why believe the models when they are all gung ho about slamming a huge hurricane into NYC? Why?? Learn your lesson!!  Ok, so I did rant for a second. But, that's it. There is nothing I can do about it. When a lot of mets see the pretty pictures they are wowed by them. They see some depiction of something major going on and are unable to say "fine, but this isn't real". That saddens me. I did a 2 hour analysis w/o the models and said "outer-banks". It wasn't hard!  Notice my post before this. I just glanced at the models and I said "looks bad for the Domincan and Haiti" --- that was wrong. It was all over a Florida hit --- wrong. But when I did the analysis, I said NC and it's spot on. I'm not genius. I'm no superstar. It's called education, practice, and not being lazy. It's called being a meteorologist and NOT a model observer. Anyone can tell me what the models say. What skill is that? Anyone can get excited over every possible doomsday scenario. Big deal. How bout doing some real forecasting and making a decision on what WILL happen!


 Turns out, I couldn't help but rant .. :)

I didn't even proof this post so forgive me for any bad grammar or spelling. I just feel like spitting out some weather thoughts.

One last thing..I do think this will cause problems. North Carolina could get quite a bit of damage, namely the outer-banks. This is a big big hurricane (size wise) and thus can make for a big storm surge. The storm may come in at high tide in Long Island which will make matters worse. Flooding, beach erosion, and a long time of tropical storm force winds (which are not even severe, mind you, but still) will likely cause quite a bit of havoc. And I'm sure some numnuts will try to swim or surf in the water and die. So caution should be taken.

But please, listen to NHC and turn off The Weather Channel. Listen to your local National Weather Service offices and Emergency Mgmt. Turn off the Weather Chanel. Please, oh please, turn off the model happy station and ratings hungry station. You don't need hype. You need level headed forecasting.

TS Irene

 For far more info about Irene, I encourage you to read the discussions provided by the National Hurricane Center, http://www.nhc.noaa.gov

For now, Irene has a lot of qualities that are healthy -- in that Irene will likely strengthen -- and a few that, for now, are not so healthy.

Animated GIF: Click to animate this image

You see most of the convection (thunderstorm activity) on the north side of Irene. As you animate it (click on it to animate) you will see this better. The southern part of the storm system, rotating cyclonically, or counterclockwise, is fairly void of sustained convection in the bottom semi-circle. But, if you look closely, you will see the high level cirrus clouds flowing out and away from the storm system in a clockwise, or anti-cyclonic, direction.. That is the upper level high pressure that is formed over the system. The analysis over the region shows a nice ridge (high pressure) over this area and that will allow the hurricane to "vent" well. This will coincide with the low levels sucking in air at a greater rate, lowering pressures and increasing winds. As this process continues, thunderstorms should wrap around the center in a more evenly fashion. This will all serve to strengthen the tropical storm -- likely to be a hurricane soon (sustained winds exceeding 74mph.)

The tough part of this forecast is that by the time it really gets going, it will likely move over quite a bit of land, and mountain laden lands at that. The more land, the more friction a tropical system encounters as well as time away from its main source of fuel, warm water. This weakens the storm substantially. Mountainous lands can really tear apart a tropical storm. If the storm moves over Cuba, that can really spell the end of Irene as that terrain is very volatile to a tropical system.

Here are the model solution possibilities of the track of this storm ..

"Spaghetti Plot": Various model solutions of the track of Irene

  As you can see, there is quite a bit of spread, and none of this really handles well the ability of Irene to stay healthy while over land. Any more time over land and the track beyond the Dominican and Haiti can be completely disrupted. If it moves over water more than land, or more quickly over the land, well, this could be serious trouble for Florida (or maybe the Gulf Coast or GA/SC.) The upper level pattern appears to be very favorable for strengthening and the ocean water temps in the area (and heat content, too) are more than sufficient.

So now we wait. We wait to see if 1) Will Irene finally wrap convection completely around the center of circulation and 2) will it encounter quite a bit of mountainous land or not and 3) How will it steer in next 3-5 days. .

2011 Ties Record for Billion-Dollar Disasters

There have been 9 weather disasters this year that have broken the billion-dollar barrier and most of them exceed that billion dollar threshold. It has been an expensive year, for sure. Snow storms, floods, droughts, tornadoes, and ..... well .. hurricane season is now upon us. The current pattern, that seems to have some legs, does not give a large potential to hurricanes hitting the US. However, for one to slip into Florida or the Gulf Coast states is not out of the realm of plausibility. On other hand, tropical activity is sorely needed for much of the Southern US as drought conditions are at extreme levels. The best case scenario would be several land falling tropical storms that aren't that dangerous, but park themselves over the Southern US or Southern Plains and drop copious amounts of rain..and try to do it w/o flooding or producing tornadoes. The delicate balance of atmospheric phenomena is never boring to observe!

Here is the list, via Accu-weather: AccuWeather.com - Weather News | 2011 Ties Record for Billion-Dollar Disasters

 By the way, since 1980, there have been 108 billion dollar weather disasters. Here is the breakdown, state by state. 

Image courtesy of NCDC/NOAA

Here is a list and published report on the disasters since 1980:  http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/reports/billionz.html

Losing our sunlight quickly in August

When I was a kid, I always hated when the calendar flipped to August. It was the last month of summer vacation, and in fact, I was in school before the end of the month. I still do not love the approach of September. I admit, there is no better weather in Chicago than in September into early October. Flat out, it is the best weather you can have. But something about the loss of daylight, the cooler nights, the loss of summer, is a little depressing. If somehow we could skip the period from Nov 15th to March 15th, I think I would have no problem with it, but I haven't found a way to make that happen yet. haha.

So the very long days, abundant sunshine, and warm summer nights are coming to an end.

August is the month where the light rapidly decrease. We lose a little over an hour of daylight from Aug 1st to Aug 31st .. about 2 minutes a day.  From timeanddate.com

Rising and setting times for the Sun

			Azimuth		Length of day
Date	Sunrise	Sunset	Sunrise	Sunset	This day	Difference

Aug 1, 2011	5:44 AM	8:09 PM	65°	295°	14h 24m 52s	− 2m 06s
Aug 2, 2011	5:45 AM	8:08 PM	65°	295°	14h 22m 43s	− 2m 08s
Aug 3, 2011	5:46 AM	8:07 PM	65°	294°	14h 20m 33s	− 2m 10s
Aug 4, 2011	5:47 AM	8:06 PM	66°	294°	14h 18m 21s	− 2m 12s
Aug 5, 2011	5:48 AM	8:04 PM	66°	294°	14h 16m 07s	− 2m 13s
Aug 6, 2011	5:49 AM	8:03 PM	66°	293°	14h 13m 52s	− 2m 15s
Aug 7, 2011	5:50 AM	8:02 PM	67°	293°	14h 11m 35s	− 2m 16s
Aug 8, 2011	5:51 AM	8:01 PM	67°	293°	14h 09m 17s	− 2m 18s
Aug 9, 2011	5:52 AM	7:59 PM	68°	292°	14h 06m 57s	− 2m 19s
Aug 10, 2011	5:53 AM	7:58 PM	68°	292°	14h 04m 35s	− 2m 21s
Aug 11, 2011	5:54 AM	7:57 PM	68°	291°	14h 02m 13s	− 2m 22s
Aug 12, 2011	5:56 AM	7:55 PM	69°	291°	13h 59m 49s	− 2m 24s
Aug 13, 2011	5:57 AM	7:54 PM	69°	290°	13h 57m 23s	− 2m 25s
Aug 14, 2011	5:58 AM	7:53 PM	70°	290°	13h 54m 57s	− 2m 26s
Aug 15, 2011	5:59 AM	7:51 PM	70°	290°	13h 52m 29s	− 2m 27s
Aug 16, 2011	6:00 AM	7:50 PM	71°	289°	13h 50m 01s	− 2m 28s
Aug 17, 2011	6:01 AM	7:48 PM	71°	289°	13h 47m 31s	− 2m 29s
Aug 18, 2011	6:02 AM	7:47 PM	71°	288°	13h 45m 00s	− 2m 30s
Aug 19, 2011	6:03 AM	7:45 PM	72°	288°	13h 42m 28s	− 2m 31s
Aug 20, 2011	6:04 AM	7:44 PM	72°	287°	13h 39m 55s	− 2m 32s
Aug 21, 2011	6:05 AM	7:42 PM	73°	287°	13h 37m 22s	− 2m 33s
Aug 22, 2011	6:06 AM	7:41 PM	73°	286°	13h 34m 47s	− 2m 34s
Aug 23, 2011	6:07 AM	7:39 PM	74°	286°	13h 32m 11s	− 2m 35s
Aug 24, 2011	6:08 AM	7:38 PM	74°	286°	13h 29m 35s	− 2m 36s
Aug 25, 2011	6:09 AM	7:36 PM	75°	285°	13h 26m 58s	− 2m 37s
Aug 26, 2011	6:10 AM	7:34 PM	75°	285°	13h 24m 20s	− 2m 37s
Aug 27, 2011	6:11 AM	7:33 PM	76°	284°	13h 21m 42s	− 2m 38s
Aug 28, 2011	6:12 AM	7:31 PM	76°	284°	13h 19m 03s	− 2m 39s
Aug 29, 2011	6:13 AM	7:30 PM	77°	283°	13h 16m 23s	− 2m 39s
Aug 30, 2011	6:14 AM	7:28 PM	77°	283°	13h 13m 43s	− 2m 40s
Aug 31, 2011	6:15 AM	7:26 PM	78°	282°	13h 11m 02s	− 2m 40s