Comments for Dan's Wild Wild Weather Journal

Comment on Tropical Trouble Times 2 by Dan Satterfield

Dan Satterfield — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 00:59:16 +0000

@Mike Wilhelm: Yes Mike, shear is the factor that has kept the hurricane from reaching Cat 4 strength today. The shear will keep it from getting much stronger but it may grty a little stronger before landfall if the shear lessens slightly.

Comment on Tropical Trouble Times 2 by Mike Wilhelm

Mike Wilhelm — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 05:51:56 +0000

Hi Dan. The thing I am wondering about is dry air that might get entrained into the system (which is unlikely once Gustav becomes => Cat 3. The other potential inhibiting factor would be shear, right?

Comment on Back In the Classroom- Well at the front of it! by Matt

Matt — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 15:33:18 +0000

I am very happy for James Paul Dice. I will miss seeing him on Channel 19 but think he will really improve things at Channel 6 . . . not that they were bad to begin with but J.P. is the only one I can think of who would give the good old Spann man any major competition in the Birmingham market.

I’m amazed that teachers still get in trouble for teaching evolution . . . I went to a little school in Nauvoo, Alabama with only about 500 students and they taught evolution. Then again that was ten years ago. As for climate change I’m still undecided. I think unnecessary pollution of the atmosphere is always a bad thing whether it causes catastrophic climate change or not . . . but all the politics involved in it make me wary of some of the more outspoken people on the issue . . . I’d like to hear what some operational meteorologists think about it, actually. Most of what I’ve heard has been from television . . . and you know how reliable that is . . .

Comment on CoCoRahs-What A Great Idea by Alex

Alex — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 03:27:55 +0000

I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you down the road!

Comment on Matt Harding- I nominate him for The Nobel Peace Prize by Jennifer

Jennifer — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 07:39:42 +0000

Wow, I actually cried watching that. When it comes down to it, we’re all people and he just made the whole world dance together like it should be. I’m still crying, that was beautiful.

Comment on CoCoRahs-What A Great Idea by Dan Satterfield

Dan Satterfield — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 01:17:05 +0000

No problem Mike. It is such a worthwhile project. I would hope more young people get involved. It is a great introduction to science. Most participants likely do not realize how this data will be used for many years in the future by researchers who are not even born yet!

Comment on CoCoRahs-What A Great Idea by Mike Wilhelm

Mike Wilhelm — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 00:05:41 +0000

Thanks, Dan for mentioning this. I am the CoCoRaHs coordinator for Cullman County. It is a tremendous program. Maybe a good way to increase awareness and usage is through science departments in local middle and high schools. And I couldn’t agree more about the rain gauge accuracy.

Comment on A Fascinating Week by sue

sue — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 20:09:19 +0000

thanks for another great link — I really would love to go to an existing SOS site and see that presentation tool in action.

Comment on Biofuel or Biofood by sue

sue — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 19:37:44 +0000

Dan, thanks for the great link to the UMass Lignocellulosic biofuels conference. I will check back for the resources page when they get that up and running. About a year ago, a friend of mine (a Ph.D. chemist) was telling me a little bit about some of this work in general terms, and I’d planned to sit down with him and get more references on the topic. Unfortunately he died in a car crash a few months later, and I never got back to the topic. So I really appreciate your post and the link.

Just another thought, on the problems of conventional crops for biofuels (whether it be corn, sugar cane or palm oil) — not only does converting grassland and natural forest land into crop land release more carbon, but it turns complex ecosystems that provide many other biosphere functions (water control and filtering among others) into monocrop lands that don’t provide the same functions.
Sue