An atmospheric river flowing into California. Image courtesy of NOAA Strong El Niño – Floods for California: are they correlated? El Niño can impact California greatly but it does not promise flooding, nor rain. It instead promises a shifting of the region’s atmospheric currents. Strong El Niños (1.5°C or more of warming), however, are strong
Read MorePhoto taken July 17, 2014 of wildfires in Washington. Image courtesy of NASA. Wildfires – Global Warming / Climate Change is a top topic during the summer of 2015. Wildfires from global warming and climate change are a microcosm of the Wild West. The age of horse-driven highway bandits may be over but wildfires still
Read MoreAircrafts: flying weather stations, have been equipped to record atmospheric conditions along their flight paths. Another aircraft may not travel anywhere close to the same airspace again for a long time but the data gathered is still useful. Computers input this information, crunch the numbers and can usually forecast general threats. Weather advisories are separated
Read MoreProperty Damage and Weather hazards come in many forms. Hurricanes, tornadoes, hailstorms, floods, winter weather and wildfires are all common culprits that bear their own sets of potential threats. Hurricanes The least common of the six, hurricanes are good to begin with because they often encompass most of the ways that property damage and weather
Read MoreTornado Damage in Washington State seldom makes national headlines but, on average, it is incurred every year. Normally damage is minimal but there have been several deaths and major devastation from a few tornadoes in recent decades. Washington’s deadliest outbreak struck on April 5, 1972 when an F3 spawned over Vancouver and tracked over a
Read MoreHeavy lake-effect snowfalls can shut down entire cities and drastically impede our ways of living. In particularly prone areas, feet of lake-effect snow can arrive within a day and pin people indoors. The mechanisms that manifest lake-effect snow can be thought of as components of a unified atmospheric machine. Its creation begins when wind meets
Read MoreWeather & Airplane Crashes has been an issue of late. First, let us give some perspective and these statistics were compiled from 1,015 fatal accidents, excluding those involving less than 19 passengers, military aircraft, private aircraft and helicopters. Airplane crashes, on average, claim the lives of a thousand passengers every year. Crashes happen for many
Read MoreDr. Mike Witiw Aviation Weather Expert has just accepted a position at The University of the Turkish Aeronautical Association (UTAA)and will have the title Professor Doctor there starting in February 2016. Dr. Witiw will continue as Associate Professor Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University Worldwide (meteorology, exploration in physics, mathematics-algebra through calculus, graduate course in statistics). Dr. Witiw
Read MoreHow Midwestern blizzards are born. A Midwestern blizzard, the most common type, is born when a cyclonic, deep low spins next to a very cold, very high-pressured anticyclonic Canadian air mass while it pushes southeasterly into the upper Midwest. If the pressure gradient between the two air masses tightens, wind speeds increase. Moisture in the
Read MoreBlizzards and winter storms can be more dangerous than summer storms. America’s worst winter weather comes from blizzards, which can be generated by specific conditions in the upper Midwest and by nor’easters on the east coast. Other regions of the US are seldom hit. The National Weather Service issues a blizzard warning when it projects
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