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When did computer-based weather forecasts begin?
Immediately after World War II, it became fashionable to imagine technologies that might allow human beings to control the weather. In fact, one goal advocated by influential scientists was actually to explode nuclear bombs in the right locations and in the right quantity to alter the weather in favorable ways.
Such an enterprise would require accurate forecasts of the weather thought possible by using brand new computer technology to make the millions of requisite calculations. Continue reading
How strong a wind will knock someone over?
We have had some hefty winds this past week.
The wind can displace objects, including people. Continue reading
What was that stuff that fell on Thursday?
On Thursday, many locations in southern Wisconsin experience snow squalls in which the falling precipitation was momentarily quite intense.
This event was an example of shallow convection – as opposed to the deep convection of summertime thunderstorms. Thursday’s shallow convection was spawned by a conspiracy of circumstances occurring at different levels in the atmosphere. Continue reading
Is the reduction in air traffic affecting the weather?
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a reduction in air traffic. This reduction has had at least two impacts so far, one relating to the exhaust from aircraft engines and the other to weather forecasts.
Exhaust from aircraft engines can be seen sometimes as condensation trails, or contrails. The exhaust of an aircraft contains both gas and tiny particles called aerosols. Both of these are important in the formation of contrails. Contrails form when water vapor condenses and freezes around the small particles that exist in aircraft exhaust. Continue reading
Why does the severe weather threat increase as spring and summer approach?
As the threat of winter snows recedes across the country, it is replaced by the threat of severe weather — thunderstorms with hail, damaging winds and tornadoes.
The severe weather season, though broadly spanning March through August across the United States, is actually quite regional. It begins in March in the southern states, moves to the southern Plains during April and May, and then farther north toward the Great Lakes states during the summer. Continue reading
Category: Meteorology, Seasons, Severe Weather
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