April 25-28 Tornado Outbreak/La Nina link?

Just two weeks ago the United States was struck by a tornado outbreak which was named the deadliest tornado outbreak since the Super Tuesday outbreak in 2008. Now the United States has been struck by another system that is currently ongoing, and has surpassed the previous April 14 -17 tornado outbreak as the deadliest since the Super Tuesday outbreak. It is also the worst the United States has had since the Super Outbreak in 1974. Currently there have been 273 deaths from the storm and many of those deaths occurred in Alabama, where and tornado struck Tuscaloosa. Footage from witnesses have captured the intensity of storm. This amazing footage of the tornado was recorded by Christoper England of Crimson Tide Productions at the University of Alabama:



The magnitude of the storm is incredible. Many experts are calling this tornado outbreak "historic" as the average amount of tornadoes in April is 133 and this storm along produced more than 260. Some are even saying that "Tornado Alley" may have shifted south. So what could be causing these tornado outbreaks? Well many experts are looking at the current La Nina oscillation which may play a role in the weather we have been receiving. Normally during a La Nina "the jet stream tends to move north through the Pacific Northwest and Great Lakes, keeping cold air on the northern side while the southern side tends to have warm, humid air. Cold fronts that would dry out the atmosphere on the south side are blocked, which means wet storms there." source

The result can develop tornadoes. As with the current outbreak, a cold front was met with warm, moist air in the south and a strong upper level jet, and lead in the development of the tornadoes.

The 1974 outbreak occurred during a La Nina year. Another La Nina year was 1999 when the Oklahoma tornado outbreak occurred. The duration of the event was May 3-6 and 140 tornadoes were confirmed. La Nina pattern we are in is currently weakening, so does this mean the intensity and the frequency of the tornadoes will subside? Looking at a chart by NOAA, on the number of tornadoes in April from 1950 to 2010, we can see an increase in the frequency of tornadoes in the past four years. This chart also provides a big picture of the events and looking at the decadal averages we can see an increase in the number of tornadoes in the pass decade. Not every year included in the chart was a La Nina year however and though the number of tornadoes may be increasing, the effect by a La Nina pattern is not as clear.


Below is a map of the storm reports for April 27, 2011. It is has since been updated.

This is the activity chart for yesterday.


Here is the radar:

All images are from NOAA.

Summery Then Back To Spring

DC Area Forecast
(April 25-May 1)

What a warm and sunny Easter Sunday this is. There is a severe thunderstorm watch in effect for our area until 9 PM however, so don't forget those umbrellas if you're heading out later this evening.

For Monday we'll see the warm trend continue as we can expect partly sunny skies and a high near 88. We also see some slightly breezy conditions, with south wind between 6 to 12 mph. Monday night expect partly cloudy skies with a slight chance for showers in the early morning hours. Expect a low near 65 and south wind around 8 mph. A warm front will move into the region by Tuesday, leaving the region in a warm, moist airmass by Wednesday. For Tuesday we can expect a high near 83 with mostly sunny skies and southerly wind at 10 to 15 mph. Tuesday night expect mostly cloudy skies and a low near 64. We can expect mostly cloudy skies and a high near 84 for Wednesday. Wednesday night looks to be mostly cloudy with a slight chance of thunderstorms and a low around 63. A strong cold front will move through the region on Thursday, bringing temperatures back down to more Spring-like. Don't forget your umbrellas or rain boots because we can expect showers and thunderstorms for Thursday and a high near 72. There is a chance of thunderstorms Thursday night, as we can expect mostly cloudy skies with a low around 50. For Friday into Sunday we can expect drier conditions with highs in the low 70s and partly sunny skies. Expect nighttime temperatures in the upper 40s to low 50s.

source

That Green Film

You've probably seen it by now. That film on your car making it appear greenish. Or one which is creeping on your front porch. It's pollen season and pollen is very present in the air. I suffer from seasonal allergies and I know if you do too, the sneezing and watery eyes can be quite common during medium to high pollen level days.

Unfortunately for readers within the DC metro area, the pollen outlook looks to be on the rise. The temperatures reaching into lower 80s for the start of this week, and the low dewpoint, has an influence on the dispersal of pollen. What this means is that the allergy level for the start of next week is high and allergy suffers can be looking at an increase in allergy symptoms. These symptoms may als0 become more severe as the warmer temperatures and low dewpoint progress.

To learn more about the pollen level in your area check out Pollen.com. The site has great information such as the various types of allergies and a history of allergy levels in your area.

Just a little comic relief from all the sneezing:

Image Credit

41 Years Later...Still Going Strong

Yay, another Earth Day post!!! :-)

It's wonderful to see how Earth Day has grown to become a magnificent event over the past 41 years. Below is the first part in a thirteen part CBS Special News Report about Earth Week (April 16 to 22), anchored by Walter Cronkite in 1970.



Over 500 million people all over the world take part in various Earth Day events now and even some web have gone green for this day. Just take a look at some of these sites:





Wherever you are and whatever you're doing to raise awareness and to help make this planet a better place for all Earth's inhabitants, keep it up! Earth is a beautiful planet. Let's keep it that way! Make everyday Earth Day :-)

Arsenic Removal in Noakhali

Happy Earth Day everyone!!!

Just wanted to share with you, a documentary created by my friend Hamshi Karunarajah, author of Climate Surprise, and her research group at the Asian University for Women, in Chittagong, Bangladesh. The documentary focuses on using Chinese Brake Ferns as an eco-friendly implement to the remove arsenic from ground water in Noakhali. Check it out:

Seattle Visit

Earlier this year, I boarded a plane to Seattle, Washington. It was for the 91st Annual American Meteorological Society Conference. I had a great time at the conference and in Seattle and I just wanted to share some pictures I took while I was there. The Cascade Range is so gorgeous!!!

View of Mount Rainier from the plane

Lenticular clouds and Mount Rainier

Some of the Casacade Mountains

Me atop the Space Needle

Mount Rainier with Lenticular Clouds

View of the Bay

Flying over dense fog

Mount Rainier and valley fog

This isn't really weather related, but I thought it was something cool that I saw, while I was there.

It's Life-Size Chess!

Earth Day 2011/BP Oil Spill

April 22nd is Earth Day 2011 and it is quickly approaching. On this day many celebrations and events take place around the world, in order to help the environment and raise awareness about topics such as power consumption, recycling and conversation. Planet Earth is the only planet we have and we should help to make the world a better place, not for ourselves but for other inhabitants.

One year ago today was the worst oil spills in U.S. history. This was the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill (also known as the BP Oil Spill) occurred in the Gulf of Mexico near the Mississippi River Delta. Eleven people lost their lives in a wellhead blowout which caused the spill and hundreds of wildlife were affected. This picture from Yahoo Images, shows a dead fish floating atop a pool of oil.

Image Credit

Though difficult to look at, this image shows some of the impact of the disaster on wildlife. About 4,900,000 barrels of crude oil leaked over a 2,500 to 68,000 square mile radius and though the spill date ended on July 15, 2010, the well wasn't officially sealed until September 19. I remember watching CNN and seeing commentators and images of the oil rig and the coast line covered in oil on the main screen. This was followed by a live picture of the well still leaking oil, towards the bottom of the screen. I also remember breathing a small sigh of relief when the well was officially sealed. The clean up lasted for months. If you'd like to read about the incident, Wikipedia has a good article on it. Check it out here.

The environmental impact is still ongoing and according to Wikipedia, " In January 2011, an oil spill commissioner reported that tar balls continue to wash up, oil sheen trails are seen in the wake of fishing boats, wetlands marsh grass remains fouled and dying, and that crude oil lies offshore in deep water and in fine silts and sands onshore. A research team found oil on the bottom of the seafloor in late February 2011 that did not seem to be degrading. NOAA declared "an unusual mortality event," ongoing since last February 2011, after a spike in the number of dead dolphins washing up in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida."

This Earth Day let us not forget the disaster of the BP Oil Spill as well as other disasters that had effects had on the inhabitants of this planet. Let us find better ways to manage these incidents, as unfortunately they will occur. RestoreTheGulf.gov is a wonderful site towards providing information about the restoration in the Gulf and EarthDay.org is a great site looking at the Earth Day events occurring in your local area and around the globe. We should continue to reuse, reduce and recycle, and find ways of better sustainability. A little love can go a long way, especially when thinking of not only for ourselves, but our for future dependents, and other inhabitants (such as animals and trees), that exist in this world with us.

Seasonable Temps and Showers

Area Forecast
Washington, DC
(April 18- April 24)

April's transition is getting a bit smoother this week as a high pressure system remains to our south. For Monday we can expect partly sunny skies and a high near 70. Winds will be from the south at 8 to 10 mph. Monday night we can expect expect increasing clouds and a low near 53 as the high moves off the coast. Winds will be from the south at 11 to 14 mph. A low pressure system develops near the region for Tuesday as we can expect a slight chance of showers in the afternoon and a high near 73. Tuesday night there is a slight chance for showers and thunderstorms with a low near 57. That low pressure system moves in for Wednesday as we can expect showers mainly after 2 pm and a high near 80. There's a slight chance for showers Wednesday night as we can expect mostly clouds skies and a high near 55. Thursday we can expect partly sunny skies as that low pressure system moves north and high pressure moves towards the region. Expect a high near 63. Thursday night we can expect a low near 46 and partly cloudy skies. For Friday we can expect partly cloudy skies and a high near 64 as that high moves into the region. Friday night looks to be partly cloud with a low near 47. Saturday a low pressure system from our west moves in. Expect a chance of showers with mostly cloudy skies and a high near 69 and expect partly cloudy skies and a chance of showers for Saturday night. Low near 57. That low will remain in the region for Sunday as we can expect mostly cloudy skies and a chance of showers with a high near 70. Sunday night looks to bring a chance of showers with mostly cloudy skies and a low near 55.

source: NOAA

Tohoku Earthquake/The Storms Came A Rumbling

Well hello everyone, what a long time it's been since I've last posted. It's almost been a year! So much has happened during that time. I graduated from Kean University and now I'm attending Howard University pursing a Ph.D.

So much weather has occurred as well. More recently back on March 11, 2011, the Tohoku earthquake which was a devastating 9.0 earthquake. It struck off the coast of Japan and triggered a major tsunami which caused a tremendous loss of life. There were over 1021 recorded aftershocks, in with more than 63 of them were over 6.0. On the one month anniversary of the disaster, a 7.0 earthquake struck off the coast of Japan and tsunami warnings were issued, but later cancelled as the threat diminished. The Fukushima I Nuclear power plant has recently been rated level 7 on the International Nuclear Event Scale. Level 7 is the highest level on the scale and the only other disaster to reach this level was the Chernobyl disaster back in April of 1986. A nine-month plan has been set to move the plant into a more stable state. More information about the plan can be read here.

Yesterday we received some intense storms here in Maryland. These storms were part of severe weather pattern which caused an outbreak of tornadoes in the Southern states, over the last two days. So far 55 tornadoes were confirmed and there were over 243 tornadoes initially reported. The maximum recorded tornado was an EF3 and 40 people have lost their life. No other outbreak in the United States, before this occurrence resulted in this number of fatalities since the Super Tuesday tornado outbreak. This event occurred February 5–6, 2008 and killed 57 people.

Of the reported tornadoes, the National Weather Service is estimating it would take a few days to confirm these cases. Why you might ask? Well much of the damage may have been caused by straight-line winds and not from a tornado. With many thunderstorms there will be wind gusts, and distinguishing what type of weather phenomena occurred can be tricky. Especially for insurance claims.

Straight line winds can reach up to speeds of 130 mph which is around the same as an EF2 tornado and are caused by downbursts or outflows from the thunderstorm. The debris pattern from straight line winds, spreads out in one direction. Tornadoes are categorized as rotating columns of air caused by unstable air, lifting and moisture in the low to mid levels of the atmosphere (in summary). The debris pattern from tornadoes spreads out in different directions and is often rotational. The debris field for straight line winds can cover miles as the debris field for tornadoes tends to be more narrow, though some fields have gone out for miles.

Below is a radar image of the system I obtained from RAP Weather. The time is 2023 UTC or 4:23 PM EST (to get eastern standard time, 5 hours is subtracted from the UTC time).

The line of storms are very well defined. Here is the base reflectivity image taken from the WSR-88D Radar that I obtained from NOAA. It is of the storms for the Baltimore MD/Washington DC area. The time is 7:19 PM EST or 2313 UTC.

Notice the strong band of storms west of Washington, DC? These storms later moved further North towards Westminster.

I felt really compelled to start this blog up again. The wait is over. I'll be updating more with weather events and happenings. If you have Twitter follow me @Weathersavvy1. Stay tuned!