59 F. high in the Twin Cities Sunday.
46 F. average high on November 8.
43 F. high on November 8, 2014.
November 9, 2003:
Parts of west central and north central Minnesota receive anywhere from
2 to 6 inches of new snow. Canby had the most at 6 inches and Benson
measured 5 inches.
November 9, 1977: A foot of snow falls in Western Minnesota. I-94 is tied up.
November 9, 1850: The sky darkens at Ft. Snelling due to smoke from prairie fires.
Talking Trash - Who Really Has The "Best Weather"?America,
land of the free, home of the brave; as competitive about hometown
weather as we are our favorite college football teams.
"It's
November and people are still boating!" I bragged to my oldest son in
Seattle. "Oh yeah? Well, it's raining here, but it's a warm rain." A
friend in Scottsdale assured me "it's a dry heat". So is my oven but I
don't stick my head inside. Another friend in Naples is really looking
forward to January. "Puffy cumulus clouds, 80 degrees, what's not to
like?" Storms with names, for one. Even Maui, as close to perfect as you
can get, sees occasional hurricanes.
Is there a place with "perfect weather" and no risk? I'm not so sure that exists.
I'm
feeling even better about Minnesota, especially considering El Nino
warmth coming out of the Pacific should take some of the edge off the
winter to come.
Right now I don't see any snowstorms between now and Thanksgiving. The atmosphere will be warm enough for rain
Wednesday into
Thursday morning; some .5 to 1 inch amounts possible.
Minor
league cold fronts arrive late week, again late next week - but nothing
polar. Nothing that'll make you want to call a travel agent. November
Lite continues.
Midweek Rain Event.
Significant rain is still likely from Wednesday PM into Thursday
morning as a storm tracks almost directly over MSP; the lowest mile of
the atmosphere warm enough for mostly rain, although wrap-around
moisture coupled with falling temperatures could spark a few snow
showers up north late Thursday. Details from the Twin Cities National
Weather Service: "
A significant storm system pushing through midweek
will be capable of bringing heavy rainfall and strong winds to the
Upper Mississippi Valley late Wednesday and Wednesday night. Severe
weather is also likely to the south. Wrap around snow showers are
possible Thursday night, especially across northern Minnesota and
Wisconsin."
An Actual "Storm".
Remember those? It's been a little while since we've had a heavy,
stratiform rain event, but it seems to be real this time around, a tight
pressure gradient around an intensifying storm whipping up sustained
winds of 25-35 mph late Wednesday night and early Thursday. Map: Aeris
Enterprise.
Potential Soaker. Models suggest .80 to .90" for the Twin Cities, with most of the rain coming from noon Wednesday to abouut 8 AM Thursday.
NAM Guidance.
NOAA's 12 KM NAM model shows soaking rains for much of the east coast, a
smear of moderate to heavy rain breaking out Wednesday into Thursday
from Omaha to Mankato and the Twin Cities. Source: NOAA and
AerisWeather.
10-Day Snowfall Potential.
A few inches of snow are predicted for the Rockies and northern New
England; some lake-effect snow showers kicking in behind a big storm
spinning up over the Great Lakes by Thursday. The GFS model (above)
hints at a litlte smear of slushy snow pushing into southern Minnesota
early next week. We'll see.
Stormier Pattern Thanksgiving Week?
The GFS 500 mb pattern suggests a deep trough, even a cut-off low over
the Red River Valley within 2 weeks, with temperatures marginally cold
enough for snow, or a rain/snow mix. Thanksgiving is coming - what can
go wrong? Source: GrADS: COLA/IGES.
Climate Change and Extreme Weather: 32 Takes on 28 Events from 2014. Bob Henson has a comprehensive update and some interesting insight at a
Weather Underground post; here's an excerpt: "...
Lurking
in the background of any attribution study is the natural variation
inherent in our weather and climate system. Researchers go to great
lengths to separate any influence of climate change from the kinds of
ups and downs one would expect in a climate that didn’t have
ever-increasing greenhouse gases. This year, the states of New York and
Vermont had their coldest January-to-March period since records began in
1895, with all of the Northeast in their top-ten coldest.
Surely, the odds of getting such widespread, persistent, intense cold
over this large an area in a warming climate must be phenomenally
low--but sometimes, even very unlikely things happen. This paradoxical,
high-impact event gets my vote for inclusion in next year’s BAMS
attribution report. Stay tuned!..." (September 17, 2014 file photo from Fresh Pond, California: AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli.)
CASA's Radars Provide a New Set of Eyes on DFW's Severe Storms.
The Star-Telegram
takes a look at a new generation of radar systems that have less range,
but faster refreshes and more power resolving rotating storms in the
lowest levels of the atmosphere; here's an excerpt that caught my eye:
"...
The CASA radars aren’t as powerful as the NEXRAD
(next generation) radars that the weather service uses to see as far
out as 150 miles. Instead, the CASA radars have a 25-mile radius and
look into the lower levels of the storm, below 32,000 feet, where much
of the damaging parts of the storm take place. CASA’s network can
refresh the image every 30 to 60 seconds versus up to 5 minutes for
NEXRAD radars. “The majority of damage happens in the lower portion of
the storm,” said Juan Ortiz, Fort Worth’s emergency management
coordinator..."
Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/news/local/community/fort-worth/article43611264.html#storylink=cpy
El Nino Hits Dinner Table as Food Costs Soar Most in 3 Years.
Bloomberg Business connects the dots; here's a clip from a recent article: "
The
effects of El Nino are starting to reach the dinner table, with global
food prices rising the most in three years on supply concerns for
everything from New Zealand milk to sugar in Brazil and Southeast Asian
palm oil. An index of 73 food prices increased 3.9 percent, the biggest
jump since July 2012, to 162 in October, the United Nations Food &
Agriculture Organization wrote in a report Thursday. The return of the
El Nino weather phenomenon is changing weather conditions around the
world, damaging crops with too much rain in some areas and not enough in
others..."
Image credit here.
How Realistic is "The Walking Dead"? Ranking Pop Culture's Worst Zombie Outbreaks. Here's an excerpt from Quartz: "...The
upshot is that there’s no need to fear an undead apocalypse—at least
not of the nature most commonly presented in popular culture. That said,
these infection scenarios should at the very least get people thinking
about the importance of preparing a “bug out” bag and stocking up on supplies of food and water for natural disasters. And one last thing: get your flu shot while you’re at it."
TODAY: Mild sunshine, no weather-worries. Winds: S 10-20. High: 59
MONDAY NIGHT: Clear and comfortable. Low: 41
TUESDAY: Plenty of sunshine, still quiet. High: 57
WEDNESDAY: Rain arrives PM hours. Wake-up: 45. High: 54
THURSDAY: Periods of rain, ending by afternoon. Winds: NW 15-30. Wake-up: 42. High: 47
FRIDAY: Mostly cloudy, jacket weather. Winds: NW 10-20. Wake-up: 35. High: 42
SATURDAY: Lot's of sun. Not bad at all. Winds: SW 10-15. Wake-up: 30. High: 52
SUNDAY: Plenty of sun, still above average. Winds: NW 8-13. Wake-up: 37. High: 52
* File photo from the 1991 Halloween Superstorm courtesy of The Star Tribune.
Climate Stories...
10 Coldest and Warmest Years.
NASA's Global Climate Change web site has more perspective on the ongoing accumulation of weather coincidences: "
This animated GIF shows landmark moments that happened during the warmest and coldest years in modern record."
Peabody Energy Agrees to Greater Disclosure of Financial Risks. Here's an excerpt from
The New York Times: "
Peabody Energy,
the world’s biggest private coal company, has agreed to make more
robust disclosures to its investors about the financial risks it faces
from future government climate change
or other environmental policies and regulations that could reduce
demand for its product. The coal giant’s concessions came in response to
a two-year investigation by the New York attorney general that found
that Peabody had not been forthright with investors and regulators about
the threats to its business that the company projected in private..."
Photo credit above: "Peabody
Energy's North Antelope Rochelle Mine in Wyoming. Oil and coal
companies have come under rising pressure to disclose more about the
risks their businesses face." Credit Eduardo Porter/The New York Times
Climate Change: Have We Already Gone Too Far? Additional
warming, volalility and potential weather and water disruption is
already in the pipeline - we won't have any choice but to adapt as we
attempt to mitigate; here's an excerpt from
Forbes: "...
But
while President Obama may aim to put the US into a leadership position
in the climate change issue, a new international study on how cities and
SMEs are working to become more resilient to the consequences of
climate change shows that more than 40% of those US and UK SMEs studied
have no resilience plans in place and no plans to develop one in the
near future. Additionally, Urban Leaders believe we have already come
too far to fully mitigate the threat of climate change, according to
parallel research from Penn Schoen Berland (PSB), an American market
research, political polling and strategic consulting firm founded in
1975 and acquired by WPP in 2001. What’s needed, therefore, is a
resilience strategy combining mitigation and adaptation at the local,
national and global levels..."
20 Million Americans Threatened by Rising Seas? Maybe
I'm interpreting this paper wrong, but the authors look at the
implications of rising seas and the percentage of Americans impacted by
the end of the 21st century. Here's an excerpt of the abstract at
PNAS: "...
Analysis
based on previously published relationships linking emissions to
warming and warming to rise indicates that unabated carbon emissions up
to the year 2100 would commit an eventual global sea-level rise of
4.3–9.9 m. Based on detailed topographic and population data, local high
tide lines, and regional long-term sea-level commitment for different
carbon emissions and ice sheet stability scenarios, we compute the
current population living on endangered land at municipal, state, and
national levels within the United States. For unabated climate change,
we find that land that is home to more than 20 million people is
implicated and is widely distributed among different states and coasts..." (File photo: Andrew Demp, Yale).
New York Prepares For Up to 6 Feet of Sea Level Rise. Here are a couple of excerpts from a related story at
msn.com: "
LaGuardia
Airport is about to be rebuilt in New York City, but by the end of the
century, fish could be swimming where airplanes once parked at the
terminal. That's because sea levels in the area could rise by as much as
6 feet over the next 75 days, according to new predictions
released by the state of New York...About 500,000 people live on the
120 square miles of land that lie less than 6 feet above the mean high
tide line in the state of New York. More than $100 billion in property
value exists in that area..."
File photo: Peter Morgan, AP.
No to Keystone, Yes to the Planet. Here's an excerpt of an Op-Ed from the
New York Times Editorial Board: "...
The
pipeline, when completed, would have carried about 800,000 barrels of
oil a day from tar sands in Alberta, Canada, to refineries on the Gulf
Coast. In the grand scheme of things, this would add little to a global
output that now exceeds 90 million barrels a day. But the cumulative
impact could be huge: The tar sands contain 170 billion barrels of oil
recoverable with today’s technology and perhaps 10 times that amount in
potential resources. Because the proposed pipeline was seen as crucial
to the exploitation of these resources, allowing it to go forward would
have put the United States in the position of enabling a project that,
over time, would add significantly to already dangerous levels of atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide..." (File photo: NASA).
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