You are browsing the archive for February 2009 - Page 2 of 2 - Dan's Wild Wild Science Journal.
11 February 2009
What A Tornado Looks Like on Radar
James Paul dice, my former work partner and now Chief Meteorologist for WBRC in Birmingham, was archiving the radar data from Oklahoma City when the tornado struck Edmond on Tuesday afternoon. No matter where in the world you read my journal from, you will likely see the video shot from KFOR TV’s helicopter of the tornado tearing up houses and lives. What you will not see is what a Meteorologist …
8 February 2009
A Weekend To Remember
I love Science and History. So a weekend to do both is not something I would pass up easily. Living here in Huntsville, in North Alabama, means that I am surrounded by some of the top Earth Scientists in the World. The International Space Station was at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. My next door neighbor was one of the German rocket scientists brought over by Werner Von Braun. …
5 February 2009
Flying Saucer Clouds
Ask most Meteorologists (including me) what their favorite cloud is, and you will probably get the same answer Lennys. That’s slang term for ALTO CUMULUS STANDING LENTICULARIS Imagine a blob of air riding along in the wind. Suddenly, you run into a big mountain. As the air stream you are in, rides over the mountain, the pressure drops and so does the temperature. If it gets cold enough, the moisture …
1 February 2009
The Big Melt Gets Worse
A new report, released by the United Nations Environmental Program, has some more alarming climate news in it. The glaciers of the world are monitored by the WGM. Take a guess….yup. It’s the World Glacier Monitoring service. Funded by the WMO and others. The big news in this report is not so much that the galciers worldwide are in retreat. The real news, is that the rate of retreat in …
Dan Satterfield has worked as an on air meteorologist for 32 years in Oklahoma, Florida and Alabama. Forecasting weather is Dan's job, but all of Earth Science is his passion. This journal is where Dan writes about things he has too little time for on air. Dan blogs about peer-reviewed Earth science for Junior High level audiences and up.