Dan's Wild Wild Science Journal

I have been a little sparse in my writing here over the last few weeks, and for good reason. We have been installing a brand new state of the art weather computer system in the WHNT weather office. It’s actually a series of 6 very fast computers all networked together and integrated into the production switcher. It’s an amazing system. I can do things that I could not even image when I started doing weather on TV for KOKH TV in Oklahoma City in February of 1980.

Satellite image on our new graphics and analysis system.

I can call up the current weather for virtually any airport in the world, from the South Pole to Hanoi. I can see satellite images taken from a series of weather satellites minutes ago. What was the temperature over Pierre, South Dakota at 8,000 feet from the weather balloon launched at sunrise this morning? It’s just a couple of clicks away.

To be honest, it’s heaven itself for a weather geek!

In 1994, when I started here in Huntsville, the thought of running our own numerical weather prediction model “in house” would be laughable. It took HUGE computers at NOAA in Washington to run these models! I would get the output to forecast from. This still happens, but now we are running our own model for our region at a higher resolution than the national model run in Washington! What’s even better, I can convert the output to colourful graphics for the audience to see. No more just saying “the models say rain”, I can show it!

Best of all, I can draw on the maps again!

When I started in TV in 1980, we had magnetic boards and used water based paint to draw the fronts!  With the advent of computers, I found myself in front of a blue or green screen. The maps were electronically keyed in. This is still done today. I use a green wall every evening, and that is what I see behind me when on air. Everything the camera sees that is a certain shade of green is electronically replaced. I have monitors just off camera so, I know what to point at!

I can control the radar display with my hand and those icons on the screen. I am actually standing in front of a green wall.

This new system allows me to draw on the maps. A device on the camera follows the point farthest from my body and that is where the “mouse cursor” is. I can do anything with my fingers that I could do sitting in front of the maps on a monitor with a mouse in hand! (It definitely takes getting used to, but I love it!)

I realise that 99% of my audience just wants to know what the high will be tomorrow, and if it will rain where THEY are. Answering that question can be difficult, but I try to do it each night. People who watch me are giving me their time and in today’s frantically busy world, that is a very valuable commodity. Wasting their time is an unpardonable sin in my book.

It can be maddening to spend hours putting the maps and a detailed forecast together, only to have the phone ring and hear the words “Hey, is it gonna rain tonight?? You so want to tell them it’s called broadcasting for a reason. Turn on the TV! The forecast is availble online 24 hours a day, I cannot possibly give everyone in the viewing area a personal forecast. I would if I could though.

That said, if someone has a special event and needs some detailed information, I will always stop what I am doing and give them my best advice. It’s the least I can do, they give me their valuable time several times a week. I’ve talked with nervous brides the night before a wedding to rock concert promoters worried about lightning hitting a stage with thousand of people gathered around.

Weather model run in our office at WHNT showing cloud and precipitation forecasted at certain time. The model runs 60 hours into the future at a very high resolution. (6 km grid.) It takes about 4 hours to run the model. We run it 4 times daily.

We truly live in Gutenberg times. In 1400 there were only a few thousand books in all of Europe. Most people could not read, much less afford to own one. 20 years after Gutenberg  invented the printing press, there were a million! Your thoughts could be printed and reach thousands of more people than you could ever talk to in a lifetime.

Now we are going through such a change again. The internet has brought the worlds greatest libraries to our fingertips. There is a growing and dramatic divide between those connected to this world and those who still live in the world that existed up until around 1995.

Many times that caller asking for the weather forecast a few minutes after it was transmitted on air will say something like “I don’t have a computer or the internet”. What a great disadvantage they have. I can hear the frustration in their voice. Sometimes it’s an anger.

It’s not usually do to money, but more likely age or educational background. It’s these people who are keeping the newspapers alive…for now. We must make sure that not one student in America, or the world itself has that problem. I do get it!

My Mom is not going to join the internet generation at her age. If she wants the weather forecast, she can just call her son!

He's right you know...

Gutenberg times are scary, or at least unsettling times for many. Perhaps this is behind the anger I sometimes feel from people when I refer them to a web site they do not have the ability to look at. The world of TV is changing too. I actually think it’s fascinating, but I hear stories of old crusty reporters who have no idea how to put their well crafted news story online.

The new connected world allows me to communicate with my viewers like never before, and I LOVE IT. It is frustrating to some, who want he world to be the way it used to be.

Most people watching my weathercast in 10 years, will likely see it on a computer screen. Possibly one in they are holding in their hand. (I look better on the small screen, believe me!). However you want the forecast, it’s my job to give it to you. It’s the forecasting I care about. You might have noticed, if you read this journal frequently, that I get into Science. I didn’t sweat through all that Calculus for nothing!

I want the students I meet to have the joy I have each day doing what I love. That’s why I write this journal and the Wild Wild Weather Page. I could not possibly imagine doing a job where I look at the clock hoping for the day to be done.

Later,

Dan

My profession of Meteorology, and that of Astronomy, are the two sciences that have legions of citizen scientists who make lasting and significant contributions. The internet has increased this by an order of magnitude. It’s very gratifying to see, especially in a summer of silliness. The “war on Science” among some political groups goes on, but thousands of people around the world each day contribute to the sum of human knowledge, even if the job they make a living at has little or nothing to do with science.

COCORAHS needs you. Click to go the site

COCORAHS rain gauge.

Here are two examples. One from Meteorology, and the other from Astronomy. If you are interested in either, or both, I urge you to get involved!

First, is COCORAHS. The Community Collaborative Rain and Hail Study is growing fast. Thousands of people around the USA have bought a 29$ rain gauge, and once a day they get online and report their rainfall/snowfall. The gauges are VERY accurate, and the data is valuable not just to synoptic forecasters like me, who may show it on tv, but to climatologists and hydrologists as well.

This data will be used for many years to adjust rainfall models, help farmers and plan for urban storm runoff. It may even be instrumental in telling us how fast greenhouse gases are changing our planet. More importantly, it may become valuable in a way we cannot imagine yet.

You can find out more by going HERE.

Now, to the stars, or to be more precise, the galaxies.

Click the image to go to Galaxy Zoo and start classifying galaxies!

GALAXYZOO.ORG is a web site where you can help Astronomers classify galaxies. This needs to be done. It’s real and it’s important and computers are LOUSY at it! The images of thousands of galaxies have been taken with professional telescopes. We need some good eyes to classify them. It’s not hard, and it’s a great introduction to the way real science works.

I just saw a paper in SCIENCE that had hundreds of authors listed. These authors for the most part were not professional astronomers, they were amateurs who were observing variable stars from all over the world and sending in their data to scientists investigating them. In Science, if you contribute, you are listed on the research paper. Thousands of amateur astronomers can proudly point to their name in the worlds most respected peer reviewed publications and know that they have added to our knowledge of the Universe.

So there you are. Two of many examples of citizen science. If you know a young person who loves the unknown, point them to this post. It could be a life changer for them. Anyone can contribute and it does make a difference!

Later,

Dan

This is for high school and up, but it’s extremely well done. If you take the time to read it, you will see why 95% of climate scientists believe we are seriously tampering with our climate. No, it’s not 100%, but keep in mind, 6% of people still believe the moon landing was a hoax, and the Earth is 6,000 years old.

Click on the image to read tamino’s (Scientist) excellent explanation.

Click to read the post on Open Mind

The newest GOES weather satellite is being checked out. NASA released the image below today. It was an image in Infra Red light at 10.7 microns. What you are really looking at is temperatures. High, cold clouds are bright white. Black ground is very warm. Low clouds over the oceans at about 5-10C are darker gray.

GOES satellites are at an altitude of 40,000 kilometers. At this altitude they orbit the Earth every 23 hours 56 mins. and 47 secs. Since it takes the Earth this same time to revolve once on it’s axis against the background of stars, (Sidereal Day) the satellite hovers over the same spot on Earth! This is far, far too high to be reached by the Shuttle.

It will be put in storage until the Goes East, or Goes West fails, and then become the operational weather satellite. It’s been said that if they could only spot hurricanes, they would be worth every penny. They do a lot more!

Goes 14 Image from NASA- Click for full size.

If you have not heard of TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) it’s a an invitation only conference in which speakers get at most 20 minutes to discuss their “really good idea”. You can watch many of the presentations online, and I highly recommend them. It’s a lot cheaper than attending the conference. 8,000 Euros, and that’s if you get invited!

I saw one talk on the TED site, over the past weekend, that really grabbed my attention. It was one of those ideas, that I heard and immediately thought, this guy is right!

It’s about how we teach maths. Any science and engineering student, is taught first Algebra, and Trigonometry, as a lead in to the Calculus. This may very well be a bad idea. The one subject, I constantly wish I had more knowledge of is statistics. I rarely see that much calculus in paper on atmospheric science, but I am always looking up something in statistics!

I constantly hear myths that live on and on, because the average person has almost no knowledge of basic probability! This is especially true when it comes to understanding climate. The difference between weather and climate is easy to understand, IF you have a basic knowledge of statistics!

Most of the myths about climate change prey on the likelihood that the average Joe’s knowledge of the subject of statistics is next to nil.

IMHO it should be required for an undergraduate degree in ANY discipline.

Statistical analysis makes short work of nearly every myth you run across on a daily basis, from Astrology to almost every other urban myth. Including my annual dozen requests from people wanting to know what day to cut the onions, to keep them from coming back! (The wooly worm myth will retun in a few weeks!)

Phil Plait at Bad Astronomy has the scoop on a new one. I declare Phil the world expert on these denizens of Bunk.

So, listen to the talk instead of anymore from me: