For the Otherwise
Moderator: Super Moderators
I read in several reports that chemtrails caused massive "whipes" on radar screens. That suggests metalic content in the trails. Possible tests by the military for radar jamming? The air traffic in the area had been diverted before the trails were executed. There was a report from Linda Moulton Howe some time last summer on C2C about these occurances.
-
Guest
Greetings,
Coincidently, as to chaff and it's impact upon weather radars, some time back I wrote a paper on the subject for my agency. The gist of the paper was to the effect that at least some types of chaff are definitely detectable on weather radars and its sudden appearance could be mistaken for convective developemnt by the inattentive forecaster.
Concerning the metallic content of chaff, and thus reflectivity, that varies with type. Some chaff consists of carbon filaments with bits of glass and metal embedded within. Back in the 1980s the military suffered an interesting mishap with this type of chaff when they dropped some off the California coast during an exercise. The prevailing wind forecase went awry and, rather than drifting further out to sea as forecast, the chaff drifted inland and settled onto a power plant. There it caused extensive electrical shorts as it draped across the power lines and generation equipment. The military took note of what happened here, the ability to disrupt a power grid without destruction of the equipment, and kept it secret until the opening salvo against Iraq in 1991. One of the first things to go was the Bhagdad power grid, courtesy of our old friend chaff.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
Coincidently, as to chaff and it's impact upon weather radars, some time back I wrote a paper on the subject for my agency. The gist of the paper was to the effect that at least some types of chaff are definitely detectable on weather radars and its sudden appearance could be mistaken for convective developemnt by the inattentive forecaster.
Concerning the metallic content of chaff, and thus reflectivity, that varies with type. Some chaff consists of carbon filaments with bits of glass and metal embedded within. Back in the 1980s the military suffered an interesting mishap with this type of chaff when they dropped some off the California coast during an exercise. The prevailing wind forecase went awry and, rather than drifting further out to sea as forecast, the chaff drifted inland and settled onto a power plant. There it caused extensive electrical shorts as it draped across the power lines and generation equipment. The military took note of what happened here, the ability to disrupt a power grid without destruction of the equipment, and kept it secret until the opening salvo against Iraq in 1991. One of the first things to go was the Bhagdad power grid, courtesy of our old friend chaff.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
-
Guest
Greetings to all,
According to maryals who reads everything everybody everywhere posts, there are those who continue to insist that jet stream changes may be the product of intentional human tampering. I'll reiterate what I said before on the subject...Not a chance. And I'll talk a bit in general terms about the jet stream.
One of the reasons this will be in general terms is because there is a lot we still don't know about the workings of the jet stream - but we know enough about it to quash any idea of deliberate human tampering, simply because the scale of energy involved with the jet stream is several orders of magnitude beyond anything we are capable of producing, let alone directing. A second reason to make this a general discussion is because anything genuinely specific would involve page long equations about such things as conservation of angular momentum as the earth rotates, incoming solar radiation as a function of earth/sun angularity, etc. It was no fun for me when I had to learn them and wouldn't be any fun now to have to try to remember and write them. Better I spare us both.
Instead, let's focus on what the jet stream does. The earth recieves energy from the sun. But because the earth is a sphere, and has an atmosphere, and tilts, and rotates on it's axis, that energy arrives at different intensities around the globe. The atmosphere reacts to such imbalances by trying to equalize them. On way is through the development of large pressure systems, as I wrote a while back. These pressure systems may be quite large and deep atmospherically. The jet stream acts as an efficient energy transport mechanism between large scale pressure systems, always with the goal of equalizing energy on a global scale. Likewise, ocean currents such as the Gulf Stream, serve the same sort of function, albeit one more constrained by land masses.
I have come up with three methods by which humans could, but only with great difficulty and not very quickly, alter jet stream patterns. First, we could burn down the entire equatorial rain forests - to a much greater extent than we have already. Second, we could totally and rapidly melt the polar icecaps. Third, we could darken the earth either through much more industrial pollution (think a lot worse than the worst of Mexico City, Tokyo, or L.A....everywhere) or global nuclear war.
However, there is another method by which jet stream patterns might be changing, much more naturally and obviously. Kudos to Maryals for suggesting it. The real power source for such a change does exist, and is only a few million miles away. Even minor fluctuations in the output of the sun's solar energy, on the order of as little as one percent, whether through more solar flares or more sunspots, can have significant impacts on the climate of the earth. Such fluctuations are easily enough to alter jet stream patterns. It has happened before, and will of a certainty happen again.
I hope this removes any doubts for those who believe we are to blame for all our problems. Some really are beyond our control.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
According to maryals who reads everything everybody everywhere posts, there are those who continue to insist that jet stream changes may be the product of intentional human tampering. I'll reiterate what I said before on the subject...Not a chance. And I'll talk a bit in general terms about the jet stream.
One of the reasons this will be in general terms is because there is a lot we still don't know about the workings of the jet stream - but we know enough about it to quash any idea of deliberate human tampering, simply because the scale of energy involved with the jet stream is several orders of magnitude beyond anything we are capable of producing, let alone directing. A second reason to make this a general discussion is because anything genuinely specific would involve page long equations about such things as conservation of angular momentum as the earth rotates, incoming solar radiation as a function of earth/sun angularity, etc. It was no fun for me when I had to learn them and wouldn't be any fun now to have to try to remember and write them. Better I spare us both.
Instead, let's focus on what the jet stream does. The earth recieves energy from the sun. But because the earth is a sphere, and has an atmosphere, and tilts, and rotates on it's axis, that energy arrives at different intensities around the globe. The atmosphere reacts to such imbalances by trying to equalize them. On way is through the development of large pressure systems, as I wrote a while back. These pressure systems may be quite large and deep atmospherically. The jet stream acts as an efficient energy transport mechanism between large scale pressure systems, always with the goal of equalizing energy on a global scale. Likewise, ocean currents such as the Gulf Stream, serve the same sort of function, albeit one more constrained by land masses.
I have come up with three methods by which humans could, but only with great difficulty and not very quickly, alter jet stream patterns. First, we could burn down the entire equatorial rain forests - to a much greater extent than we have already. Second, we could totally and rapidly melt the polar icecaps. Third, we could darken the earth either through much more industrial pollution (think a lot worse than the worst of Mexico City, Tokyo, or L.A....everywhere) or global nuclear war.
However, there is another method by which jet stream patterns might be changing, much more naturally and obviously. Kudos to Maryals for suggesting it. The real power source for such a change does exist, and is only a few million miles away. Even minor fluctuations in the output of the sun's solar energy, on the order of as little as one percent, whether through more solar flares or more sunspots, can have significant impacts on the climate of the earth. Such fluctuations are easily enough to alter jet stream patterns. It has happened before, and will of a certainty happen again.
I hope this removes any doubts for those who believe we are to blame for all our problems. Some really are beyond our control.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
-
Cherry Kelly
- Pirate
- Posts: 12852
- Joined: 07-29-2000 02:00 AM
- Contact:
Rainmaker - indeed mother nature has her own agenda. Solar flares, the heat of El Nino and cool of La Nina, earthquakes, volcanoes all add up as does the normal rotation of the earth around sun, the axis tilt, etc. Sure we don't help some of the problems as you noted, but I certainly don't believe sending stuff into orbit or past the atmosphere really makes weather change...read that somewhere and laughed.
-
Guest
Greetings to all,
The following, as usual, constitutes my own well reasoned opinion, and does not represent any other parties official stand. I mention this because the subject, zebras and horses, will be slightly divergent from my usual topics for conversation.
I am a believer that most of the items heard on a couple of popular radio programs as being at the "edge of science" are there at the edge, or outside of it, for a reason; that reason being that they are scientifically unsupportable. That likewise goes for the knowledge and credibility of many of the guests on such programs. There are a few notable exceptions, an example being physicist Michio Kaku, two of whose books I own. But for the most part, many of the snippits I hear while in the same room as faithful listener Maryals, are of individuals who, figuratively hearing hoofbeats behind them, invariably claim it is a zebra or even a unicorn, rather than a plain old horse. Last night was no different as I'll explain...
The subject of discussion was a phenomenon called chemtrails. Now I'll confess that I know little of the subject, as such, but I do know a fair bit about some of the subjects associated with chemtrails; subjects the guest speaker spoke upon (or wrote upon, at his website - which I did check out) with conviction. These subjects included contrails, meteorology, weather modification, military and civilian air traffic, etc. When I note inconsistencies within the speaker's statements, what Maryals refers to as my well tuned **** meter starts pinging. I begin thinking horses, not zebras. A few examples are in order here...
On his website, in his own article, last night's speaker wrote about the phenomena of north/south chemtrails/contrails and quoted an anonomous air traffic controller as purportedly saying that U.S. air traffic routes are exclusively oriented east to west. Well, it is a funny thing but I've flown quite a few routes within the continental U.S. including such flights as Chicago to Tampa, Minneapolis to Kansas City, and Seattle to Las Vegas, and I just don't know how I could have made those flights if I was only allowed to go east or west.
Another anomoly in last night's material was a situation where the speaker noted a situation where rain fell through a chemtrail, from which certain parties subsequently had the water analyzed for trace elements, etc. I hate to say this but contrails are a high altitude phenomena, upper tropospheric to stratospheric in level. At these levels what little moisture there is exists in the form of either supercooled water droplets or ice crystals. These would not be falling through lower chemtrail levels as rain. An exception would be in the vicinity of convective (thunderstorm) activity, but in that sort of situation nearby winds are not conducive to contrail/chemtrail longevity.
It is worth noting that there are some levels and/or locations of the atmosphere where, no matter what you put into it in the way of particulate matter you will not produce anything in the way of contrails - there simply isn't the moisture available. Hence, certain weather modification scenarios, as proposed elsewhere, are patently impossible. For example, although it is geographically right next to the Pacific Ocean, the Atacama desert of Chile has places where there has been no recorded rain for over four hundred years.
I also remember the request by the speaker for anyone with a spare $20,000, to please fork it over so he could hire a specialized research aircraft to penetrate such chemtrails for the purpose of gathering air samples. there are cheaper ways to gather atmospheric air samples; one of them being the launching of balloons, a lot of them currently being sent up by talented amateur weather researchers, at a cost of a couple of hundred dollars compared to the amount asked for. I am surprised the speaker didn't suggest it as there was a recent article on the same subject in Weatherwise magazine. One of the contributing authors to that magazine is the same NOAA scientist he quotes, probably incorrectly, on the dynamics of contrail formation.
So, what happens to the rainwater once it reaches the ground? I could write a lot about the hyrdrologic cycle, but suffice it to say that for our purposes here, one of the things that happens is that it absorbs some of what it lands on. the speaker seemed to think it significant that the sampled rainwater had quartz in it. Actually, I'd have found it significant if the water had not had quartz in it, given the location. Thinking back to my geology classes I happened to remember, and subsequently verified, that Ontario and Quebec provinces of Canada are part of a geologic formation known as the Canadian shield, one of the oldest intact geologic formations on earth. One of the major features of this formation is extensive igneous (read quartz) intrusions/extrusions. So...another horse.
Aluminum was also found in the water. And, unlike quarts, I don't remember a lot of aluminum mining going on in Canada. However, much of Ontario is downwind of the a major manufacturing area situated on both sides of the Great Lakes. There you'll find lots of plants readily capable of pumping high quantities of aluminum, carbon, and a variety of other elements into the airstream. This same industrial area has been deemed possibly responsible for the phenomena known as acid rain - which has had a certain adverse effect upon the rainwater and biological cycles along the northeastern seaboard.
I could go on at considerable length about other shortcomings in the speaker's presentation, but I believe I have made my case for scientific inconsistency within his presentation. On the other hand, in the interest of fairness in the zebra vs. horse argument, one item should be addressed. Are people getting sick in Ontario? I don't know, but I wouldn't discount it. However, rather than look for chemtrails, and the like, a better candidate idea might be to look at what is being put into the atmosphere upstream of there; the industrial pollutants of the Great Lakes rust belt. And, while not a zebra, it is a horse of another color.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
The following, as usual, constitutes my own well reasoned opinion, and does not represent any other parties official stand. I mention this because the subject, zebras and horses, will be slightly divergent from my usual topics for conversation.
I am a believer that most of the items heard on a couple of popular radio programs as being at the "edge of science" are there at the edge, or outside of it, for a reason; that reason being that they are scientifically unsupportable. That likewise goes for the knowledge and credibility of many of the guests on such programs. There are a few notable exceptions, an example being physicist Michio Kaku, two of whose books I own. But for the most part, many of the snippits I hear while in the same room as faithful listener Maryals, are of individuals who, figuratively hearing hoofbeats behind them, invariably claim it is a zebra or even a unicorn, rather than a plain old horse. Last night was no different as I'll explain...
The subject of discussion was a phenomenon called chemtrails. Now I'll confess that I know little of the subject, as such, but I do know a fair bit about some of the subjects associated with chemtrails; subjects the guest speaker spoke upon (or wrote upon, at his website - which I did check out) with conviction. These subjects included contrails, meteorology, weather modification, military and civilian air traffic, etc. When I note inconsistencies within the speaker's statements, what Maryals refers to as my well tuned **** meter starts pinging. I begin thinking horses, not zebras. A few examples are in order here...
On his website, in his own article, last night's speaker wrote about the phenomena of north/south chemtrails/contrails and quoted an anonomous air traffic controller as purportedly saying that U.S. air traffic routes are exclusively oriented east to west. Well, it is a funny thing but I've flown quite a few routes within the continental U.S. including such flights as Chicago to Tampa, Minneapolis to Kansas City, and Seattle to Las Vegas, and I just don't know how I could have made those flights if I was only allowed to go east or west.
Another anomoly in last night's material was a situation where the speaker noted a situation where rain fell through a chemtrail, from which certain parties subsequently had the water analyzed for trace elements, etc. I hate to say this but contrails are a high altitude phenomena, upper tropospheric to stratospheric in level. At these levels what little moisture there is exists in the form of either supercooled water droplets or ice crystals. These would not be falling through lower chemtrail levels as rain. An exception would be in the vicinity of convective (thunderstorm) activity, but in that sort of situation nearby winds are not conducive to contrail/chemtrail longevity.
It is worth noting that there are some levels and/or locations of the atmosphere where, no matter what you put into it in the way of particulate matter you will not produce anything in the way of contrails - there simply isn't the moisture available. Hence, certain weather modification scenarios, as proposed elsewhere, are patently impossible. For example, although it is geographically right next to the Pacific Ocean, the Atacama desert of Chile has places where there has been no recorded rain for over four hundred years.
I also remember the request by the speaker for anyone with a spare $20,000, to please fork it over so he could hire a specialized research aircraft to penetrate such chemtrails for the purpose of gathering air samples. there are cheaper ways to gather atmospheric air samples; one of them being the launching of balloons, a lot of them currently being sent up by talented amateur weather researchers, at a cost of a couple of hundred dollars compared to the amount asked for. I am surprised the speaker didn't suggest it as there was a recent article on the same subject in Weatherwise magazine. One of the contributing authors to that magazine is the same NOAA scientist he quotes, probably incorrectly, on the dynamics of contrail formation.
So, what happens to the rainwater once it reaches the ground? I could write a lot about the hyrdrologic cycle, but suffice it to say that for our purposes here, one of the things that happens is that it absorbs some of what it lands on. the speaker seemed to think it significant that the sampled rainwater had quartz in it. Actually, I'd have found it significant if the water had not had quartz in it, given the location. Thinking back to my geology classes I happened to remember, and subsequently verified, that Ontario and Quebec provinces of Canada are part of a geologic formation known as the Canadian shield, one of the oldest intact geologic formations on earth. One of the major features of this formation is extensive igneous (read quartz) intrusions/extrusions. So...another horse.
Aluminum was also found in the water. And, unlike quarts, I don't remember a lot of aluminum mining going on in Canada. However, much of Ontario is downwind of the a major manufacturing area situated on both sides of the Great Lakes. There you'll find lots of plants readily capable of pumping high quantities of aluminum, carbon, and a variety of other elements into the airstream. This same industrial area has been deemed possibly responsible for the phenomena known as acid rain - which has had a certain adverse effect upon the rainwater and biological cycles along the northeastern seaboard.
I could go on at considerable length about other shortcomings in the speaker's presentation, but I believe I have made my case for scientific inconsistency within his presentation. On the other hand, in the interest of fairness in the zebra vs. horse argument, one item should be addressed. Are people getting sick in Ontario? I don't know, but I wouldn't discount it. However, rather than look for chemtrails, and the like, a better candidate idea might be to look at what is being put into the atmosphere upstream of there; the industrial pollutants of the Great Lakes rust belt. And, while not a zebra, it is a horse of another color.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
Amen and thanks, Rainmaker. I concur.
re:con/chem trails, I have extensive movie footage of Allied B-17's and B-24's heading for the Schweinfurt ball bearing plants and Ploesti oil fields generating humongous con/chem trails. Probably at 20-25,000 ft. altitude
I also see bunny rabbits in the clouds. LOL
Joe
re:con/chem trails, I have extensive movie footage of Allied B-17's and B-24's heading for the Schweinfurt ball bearing plants and Ploesti oil fields generating humongous con/chem trails. Probably at 20-25,000 ft. altitude
I also see bunny rabbits in the clouds. LOL
Joe
Joe
God Bless America, and keep our kids safe
God Bless America, and keep our kids safe
I too, have seen those massive CONtrails in the sky. Why just the other day I saw some. They disapated inside of two minutes...unlike the chemtrails I also saw this past Monday. They lasted all afternoon, gradually drifting down into a nice haze, that went from horizon to horizon. I have reports from other ham operators all over the Puget Sound area, that saw the very same thing. About those bunny rabbits...any of them named Harvey?
-
Cherry Kelly
- Pirate
- Posts: 12852
- Joined: 07-29-2000 02:00 AM
- Contact:
-
eliza_nightvoice
- Pirate
- Posts: 1814
- Joined: 01-20-2002 03:00 AM
Having once lived within the flight path to a major international airport, I had ofter noticed strange contrail patterns. Some were really neat, like all the contrails converging to a point toward the horizon in a "fan pattern". Also, some of these patterns took a long time to disperse and reminded me of fair weather "horse tail" clouds as they did. (Prof. Rainmaker, forgive me, Weather 101 for Dummies was a long time ago.)
We might be seeing horses, but it's a lot more interesting discussing zebras and unicorns.
[This message has been edited by eliza_nightvoice (edited 01 March 2002).]
We might be seeing horses, but it's a lot more interesting discussing zebras and unicorns.
[This message has been edited by eliza_nightvoice (edited 01 March 2002).]
-
alaskandevil
- Pirate
- Posts: 1761
- Joined: 11-26-2000 03:00 AM
thanks rainmaker....nice to have a little reason to go with the other.
I agree with you when you said that the east/west only flight plans were hokey. How do you get to Deadhorse if you can only fly east/west? Or how do you fly the polar routes using the east/west rule? How can you get anywhere from Alaska to the lower 49 without going north/south?
I find that people will swallow almost anything if it is presented just right. Yes the military has done spraying(ie the spraying of pesticides here in Alaska) and has the equipment to spray almost anything and probably has done so. But to see this as a vast conspiracy is streaching it a bit far in my opinion. Having served in the AirForce it is hard for me to see thousands of GI's keeping a secret. We tend to spill the beans,so to speak, rather easily. I got GI's with very top clearences to tell me all about what they were doing in violations of all kind of orders so stop and think people about how many would have to be in the loop and how many mouths there are. You can keep a secret with a few but not many.
------------------
"FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION. It comes bundled with the software."
"We are the people your parents warned you about"
J. Buffett
I agree with you when you said that the east/west only flight plans were hokey. How do you get to Deadhorse if you can only fly east/west? Or how do you fly the polar routes using the east/west rule? How can you get anywhere from Alaska to the lower 49 without going north/south?
I find that people will swallow almost anything if it is presented just right. Yes the military has done spraying(ie the spraying of pesticides here in Alaska) and has the equipment to spray almost anything and probably has done so. But to see this as a vast conspiracy is streaching it a bit far in my opinion. Having served in the AirForce it is hard for me to see thousands of GI's keeping a secret. We tend to spill the beans,so to speak, rather easily. I got GI's with very top clearences to tell me all about what they were doing in violations of all kind of orders so stop and think people about how many would have to be in the loop and how many mouths there are. You can keep a secret with a few but not many.
------------------
"FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION. It comes bundled with the software."
"We are the people your parents warned you about"
J. Buffett
" Edited for Political Correctness "
-
Guest
Greetings to all,
I thought you might be interested in knowing how a meteorologist spent the weekend; something anecdotal rather than technical for a change - I'll get to the technical aspects maybe next message. Mind this last weekend was not exactly a typical one, as you'll see.
By way of preface, I worked Thursday, was off Friday (and ignored the weather, not looking at a map or satellite picture), and on Saturday morning I left balmy Anchorage and flew to Seattle for a meeting. Upon arrival in Seattle I thought for a moment that the pilot had erred and we'd returned to Anchorage by mistake, it was snowing that heavily. For the day five inches fell and some of the local meteorologists at the meeting said that Seattle was undergoing its snowiest March on record. Perhaps some of you can confirm that? I do remember light snow was also falling when I passed through there earlier in the month on my way to Las Vegas. It was also quite chilly, and I was glad I'd thought to throw in a sweatshirt in my luggage.
The meeting ended early Sunday afternoon, after which I and several of my fellow mets returned to the airport, only to get caught in a snarl of delayed and cancelled flights. Upon inquiry we were told that the flights were being delayed/cancelled because of snow in Anchorage. My colleagues and I found this to be a dubious statement. We had a combined several decades of experience, much of it in Alaska and had never known Anchorage International to be shut down by snow. What to do...?
Well, we all phoned out contacts back here in Anchorage. The first words out of my contact's mouth, (and he was in charge of airspace for the whole state) were "I bet we've got more snow than you do". Oh oh...
Turns out that Anchorage had quite a bit more; record breaking more as a matter of fact. In just a twenty four hour period the airport had gotten 28.6 inches of snow; enough to stall aircraft, reduce visibility such that one aircraft taxied into another, necessitate multiple deicing trips by waiting aircraft, require diversions to Fairbanks, etc.
I was lucky in that I made it out of Seattle and into Anchorage ahead most of my colleagues. I arived in a city killed by almost two and a half feet of snow. Few roads plowed, only four wheel drive vehicles moving, bus service cancelled, few taxis running, some vehicles stalled and buried at intersections and along the sides of city streets, no mail delivery, and the beat goes on. But it took the largest twenty four hour snowfall in the city's history to bring things to such a state. The previous record was a now laughable fifteen inches of snow.
Poor Maryals wore herself down trying to dig out our four wheel drive, and couldn't muster the strength to get to the airport (but some total stranger passed by with a snowthrower and finished the digging job for her; a testament to basic Alaskan friendliness). I'd figured to grab a taxi but scratched that idea when I saw the multitude of people waiting and the dearth of taxis. Instead a colleague of mine and I got someone from the main weather office to come over and fetch and ferry us in his large four wheel drive king cab pickup.
A couple of final notes here. You might as well know that on Saturday, as the snow was falling, the official local forecast was for "flurries". I guess you could say that forecasting is still an inexact science.
Likewise, for all their claims to scientific rationality, many forecasters are very superstitious. I am being told we'll be growing plam trees here before I'm allowed to leave town for another weekend trip.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
I thought you might be interested in knowing how a meteorologist spent the weekend; something anecdotal rather than technical for a change - I'll get to the technical aspects maybe next message. Mind this last weekend was not exactly a typical one, as you'll see.
By way of preface, I worked Thursday, was off Friday (and ignored the weather, not looking at a map or satellite picture), and on Saturday morning I left balmy Anchorage and flew to Seattle for a meeting. Upon arrival in Seattle I thought for a moment that the pilot had erred and we'd returned to Anchorage by mistake, it was snowing that heavily. For the day five inches fell and some of the local meteorologists at the meeting said that Seattle was undergoing its snowiest March on record. Perhaps some of you can confirm that? I do remember light snow was also falling when I passed through there earlier in the month on my way to Las Vegas. It was also quite chilly, and I was glad I'd thought to throw in a sweatshirt in my luggage.
The meeting ended early Sunday afternoon, after which I and several of my fellow mets returned to the airport, only to get caught in a snarl of delayed and cancelled flights. Upon inquiry we were told that the flights were being delayed/cancelled because of snow in Anchorage. My colleagues and I found this to be a dubious statement. We had a combined several decades of experience, much of it in Alaska and had never known Anchorage International to be shut down by snow. What to do...?
Well, we all phoned out contacts back here in Anchorage. The first words out of my contact's mouth, (and he was in charge of airspace for the whole state) were "I bet we've got more snow than you do". Oh oh...
Turns out that Anchorage had quite a bit more; record breaking more as a matter of fact. In just a twenty four hour period the airport had gotten 28.6 inches of snow; enough to stall aircraft, reduce visibility such that one aircraft taxied into another, necessitate multiple deicing trips by waiting aircraft, require diversions to Fairbanks, etc.
I was lucky in that I made it out of Seattle and into Anchorage ahead most of my colleagues. I arived in a city killed by almost two and a half feet of snow. Few roads plowed, only four wheel drive vehicles moving, bus service cancelled, few taxis running, some vehicles stalled and buried at intersections and along the sides of city streets, no mail delivery, and the beat goes on. But it took the largest twenty four hour snowfall in the city's history to bring things to such a state. The previous record was a now laughable fifteen inches of snow.
Poor Maryals wore herself down trying to dig out our four wheel drive, and couldn't muster the strength to get to the airport (but some total stranger passed by with a snowthrower and finished the digging job for her; a testament to basic Alaskan friendliness). I'd figured to grab a taxi but scratched that idea when I saw the multitude of people waiting and the dearth of taxis. Instead a colleague of mine and I got someone from the main weather office to come over and fetch and ferry us in his large four wheel drive king cab pickup.
A couple of final notes here. You might as well know that on Saturday, as the snow was falling, the official local forecast was for "flurries". I guess you could say that forecasting is still an inexact science.
Likewise, for all their claims to scientific rationality, many forecasters are very superstitious. I am being told we'll be growing plam trees here before I'm allowed to leave town for another weekend trip.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
-
eliza_nightvoice
- Pirate
- Posts: 1814
- Joined: 01-20-2002 03:00 AM
Maryals, your hubby is a voice of reason on the contrail subject. But, I won't go there out of respect for those here to really belive. I don't, but I have been known to be wrong, once.
More importantly, did you enjoy the visit from ol' man winter?
We had 55" of snow in a week around Christmas, and just had about 30" in 3 days in early March.
In between, we only had 18" in all of Jan and Feb! Odd winter, to be sure.
Lots of fun, those big storms, at least from a purely "gawker at a car wreck" perstpective.
More importantly, did you enjoy the visit from ol' man winter?
We had 55" of snow in a week around Christmas, and just had about 30" in 3 days in early March.
In between, we only had 18" in all of Jan and Feb! Odd winter, to be sure.
Lots of fun, those big storms, at least from a purely "gawker at a car wreck" perstpective.
-
Guest
Greetings to all,
I was wandering about on the net yesterday and happened into Megman's Gym. Kudos to him for a very informative site. Then, today, I attended a luncheon lecture on avalanche mechanics. And while that is a very interesting subject, I thought I'd write a bit more generally on a subject of applicability to most of us; much in the style of Megman on supplements. Specifically, I thought it might be interesting for you if I wrote just a bit about the science of biometeorology. Basically, that deals with the impact of weather upon the human body, mind, and emotions. It may be greater than you think. Principal source reference for this is the book "Weathering" (printed in 1979 and long out of print but still very valuable and interesting none the less) by Stephen Rosen, plus others as named. Now, on to a few tidbits.
"Sensitivity to weather is largely a matter of temperment, age, physique, sex, and status". To which I might add acclimation and chance. Little known fact - the highest group scores ever achieved on a Yale entrance exam were earned in 1938. It happened that at the precise time the student group was being tested, the remnants of the Great New Engand Hurricane, including the low pressure at the eye of the storm, were passing overhead. Why couldn't that have happened when I was taking tests?
Rosen quotes a psychiatrist who states "We are certain that the weather is sufficient to tip a fluctuating, unstable, predisposed individual into any form of mental illness."
Alsaka is famous for its many cases of SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder, a depressive brought on by long winter nights. I believe there is another type of documented disorder associated with the dry Santa Anna winds of Southern California.
On a different sort of misery, in a recent issue of Weatherwise magazine, an article was devoted to tracking the blooming of various flowers and weeks, the prevailing wind impact on the dispersal of pollen, and how certain medical facilities can now calibrate these items with an uptick in asthma and allergy attack victims arriving in the emergency room.
Once the victim of a weather assult seeks help, either psychological or medical, as needed, they often discover that their weather problems are not quite over yet. The efficacy of medication, both prescription and non prescription, is impacted by the weather conditions in which you take them. For example, the effectiveness of nitroglycerin may be reduced by cold temperatures. Pheonbarbital, on the other hand may be enhanced at low temperatures, potentially dangerously lowering the body temperature, particularly in the elderly. Of course, the pharmaceutical industry is coming up with new combinations all the time and I would therefore urge you to consult your physician and pharmacist with respect to any potential temperature impacts for any medications you might be taking. Likewise, perhaps Megman might have a few comments on any temperature or other weather cautions with respect to the supplements; some of which you may not want to take before engaging in the Iditarod or the Baja 1000.
What I've written barely scratches the surface of the subject of biometeorology, or human weather sensitivity. I'm sure I'll return to this subject at a later date. In the meantime, based on our varied biometeorological sensitivities, perhaps many more of us really are weatherwise than otherwise, and just don't know it. Either way, I'll still have a lot to write about.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
I was wandering about on the net yesterday and happened into Megman's Gym. Kudos to him for a very informative site. Then, today, I attended a luncheon lecture on avalanche mechanics. And while that is a very interesting subject, I thought I'd write a bit more generally on a subject of applicability to most of us; much in the style of Megman on supplements. Specifically, I thought it might be interesting for you if I wrote just a bit about the science of biometeorology. Basically, that deals with the impact of weather upon the human body, mind, and emotions. It may be greater than you think. Principal source reference for this is the book "Weathering" (printed in 1979 and long out of print but still very valuable and interesting none the less) by Stephen Rosen, plus others as named. Now, on to a few tidbits.
"Sensitivity to weather is largely a matter of temperment, age, physique, sex, and status". To which I might add acclimation and chance. Little known fact - the highest group scores ever achieved on a Yale entrance exam were earned in 1938. It happened that at the precise time the student group was being tested, the remnants of the Great New Engand Hurricane, including the low pressure at the eye of the storm, were passing overhead. Why couldn't that have happened when I was taking tests?
Rosen quotes a psychiatrist who states "We are certain that the weather is sufficient to tip a fluctuating, unstable, predisposed individual into any form of mental illness."
Alsaka is famous for its many cases of SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder, a depressive brought on by long winter nights. I believe there is another type of documented disorder associated with the dry Santa Anna winds of Southern California.
On a different sort of misery, in a recent issue of Weatherwise magazine, an article was devoted to tracking the blooming of various flowers and weeks, the prevailing wind impact on the dispersal of pollen, and how certain medical facilities can now calibrate these items with an uptick in asthma and allergy attack victims arriving in the emergency room.
Once the victim of a weather assult seeks help, either psychological or medical, as needed, they often discover that their weather problems are not quite over yet. The efficacy of medication, both prescription and non prescription, is impacted by the weather conditions in which you take them. For example, the effectiveness of nitroglycerin may be reduced by cold temperatures. Pheonbarbital, on the other hand may be enhanced at low temperatures, potentially dangerously lowering the body temperature, particularly in the elderly. Of course, the pharmaceutical industry is coming up with new combinations all the time and I would therefore urge you to consult your physician and pharmacist with respect to any potential temperature impacts for any medications you might be taking. Likewise, perhaps Megman might have a few comments on any temperature or other weather cautions with respect to the supplements; some of which you may not want to take before engaging in the Iditarod or the Baja 1000.
What I've written barely scratches the surface of the subject of biometeorology, or human weather sensitivity. I'm sure I'll return to this subject at a later date. In the meantime, based on our varied biometeorological sensitivities, perhaps many more of us really are weatherwise than otherwise, and just don't know it. Either way, I'll still have a lot to write about.
Rainmaker
------------------
Justice Is Coming
-
alaskandevil
- Pirate
- Posts: 1761
- Joined: 11-26-2000 03:00 AM
Thanks Rainmaker.....I knew that my shoulder and knees acting up wasnt in my mind but due to the changes between highs and lows.
As for SAD....well I eat chocolate alot for some damn reason in winter....must be low serotonine levels due to the lack of sunlight.
I also buy those "full spectrum" lights to help with SAD.
Thank GOD that summer is almost here, no need for them now. Just think we will have sunshine for up to 20+hours soon....cant wait to go out and play.
------------------
"FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION. It comes bundled with the software."
"We are the people your parents warned you about"
J. Buffett
As for SAD....well I eat chocolate alot for some damn reason in winter....must be low serotonine levels due to the lack of sunlight.
I also buy those "full spectrum" lights to help with SAD.
Thank GOD that summer is almost here, no need for them now. Just think we will have sunshine for up to 20+hours soon....cant wait to go out and play.
------------------
"FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION. It comes bundled with the software."
"We are the people your parents warned you about"
J. Buffett
" Edited for Political Correctness "