And Sea Tac has such issues in spades: changes in the local environment, changes in sensors, and changing positions of the sensors. Now this is not the only site with problems, a very significant percentage of our observing sites have moved, had sensor changes, are in areas in which urbanization have occurred, or other issues. Now the only living creatures on this pristine, hard to get to island are several moose, a pack of wolves, a few park rangers, and a limited amount of visitors at any one time. I strongly suspect we are seeing the influence of the third runway. In this blog I will ask the question: did the construction of the third runway have an impact on summer temperatures reported from the airport? Bottom line: It really looks that the third runway has significantly warmed summer temperatures at the airport. My colleague, Mark Albright, calculated the difference in summer temperatures (June, July, August) between Sea-Tac and an average of four nearby official reporting locations (Olympia, McMillan Reservoir near Tacoma, Kent, and Buckley).

The Big E is a giant fair for all of New England and even has specific days and locations dedicated to each New England State. The impact of development at the runway is also suggested by looking at recent temperatures at truly neighboring observing locations (not all official). For example, here is a plot of temperatures during the afternoon of July 15th in the Sea-Tac neighborhood at 4 PM (click to enlarge). Although it is hard to see, just to the west of the weather sensors the ground sloped down a hill (Sea-Tac is on a high spot), a hill that had lots of vegetation. Massive amounts of fill were brought in to the west side of the airport–just where that vegetated hill was located. The WRF-GFS forecast is very similar, and both models forecast a fast-hitting event with mostly light precipitation for southeastern Arizona (higher amounts over mountains, especially to northeast of Tucson). Directly below is the WRF-NAM forecast for precipitation amounts through 5:00 pm MST on Monday. They found that the model’s gravity wave parameterization dominated the 1-day forecast error.

So when you read a text NWS forecast (“rain today with a chance of showers tomorrow”), that text was written by a computer program, not a human, using the graphic rendition of the forecast produced by the forecasters. However, I find seasonal forecast models to be of use as another pillar – not for their accuracy, but as another piece to the puzzle. What a great way to recycle things that may have otherwise wound up in the trash, while you provide a conversation piece for your backyard. But after construction began in 2004 (particularly in 2005 to 2006 when the heavy earth moving occurred) things changed: Sea-Tac temperatures warmed up by roughly 2F so it was the same or warmer than the surrounding, more inland, stations. Vegetation keeps daily temperatures down (mainly from evaporation of water–transpiration) and the higher you are above the surface in summer, the cooler the air. With the cold front bringing the cold air from above the jet stream and the warm front bringing warm air from below the jet stream, it was a very volatile situation to start with.

The jet stream was unusually strong, and the storm system may have even gotten some of that energy from the jet stream. CAPE values indicate potential energy that can be utilized by thunderstorms. To give you a sense of how unstable 4,000 j/kg is, 2,000 j/kg is considered the threshold for severe thunderstorms for CAPE values. Auroras are the visual evidence of geomagnetic storms, when solar winds energize particles in Earth’s magnetosphere, eventually causing some particles to collide with atmospheric molecules that give off light in response. Whenever you get a muscle pull or experience pain after a particular workout routine, you might as well skip a day’s workout, get some rest and give yourself the time for recovery. When someone is under the weather, they would love nothing more than to receive a get well message from someone, and when peppered with a little humor, the message is sure to aid speedy recovery.

I would anticipate the heaviest snowfall to hit the Upper Midwest, as well as a few big shots of snow around the Lower Great Lakes. The Plains, Midwest and Great Lakes are affected. I am predicting the setting-up of an active weather period for the Plains, Midwest and Great Lakes by the end of the month and into the winter months. Once winter actually gets underway, of course, all attention turns to any and all SSW possibilities. It is often said that you can ski in the mountains in the morning and sunbathe on the beach in the afternoon during the winter months! It is to be especially noted that Vikram Samvat 2061 started on 21 March 2004. this panchanga had hit the market in October November 2003. this confirms that the prediction was maded at least 15 months in advance. We investigated 16 different sequence-derived features and sequence-based prediction methods and tested them for discriminatory value.