You are browsing the archive for June 2012 - Page 2 of 2 - Dan's Wild Wild Science Journal.
15 June 2012
Outlawing Scientific Reality
I was asked to talk about science communication last week at an AMS/AGU seminar in Washington. It was my first visit to the headquarters for the American Association for the Advancement of Science (The AAAS publishes SCIENCE magazine, one of the top peer-reviewed journals in the world). I always learn a lot at these kind of events and this one was no different. Before the event, I searched high and low for some …
12 June 2012
More of The West Burns While Pensacola Floods
The intense drought out west is likely to cause more of these fires and the huge number of dead trees in the forests (due to the Pine Beetle) are certainly aggravating the situation. The opposite is true on the Gulf Coast with a deep layer of tropical moisture moving ashore over the weekend. Over 20 inches of rain fell in western Florida. As of late May, 37% of the U.S. …
9 June 2012
USA Has Warmest Spring On Record
The National Climate Data Center made it official today: This has been the warmest spring on record. The folks at Climate Central made me this graph (Above) that shows how far above the 20th century average the temperature was. Not only was it the warmest for the USA as a whole but it was also the warmest for a slew of states. See the image on the right. You might wonder …
Venus Transit Pics- Mine and the SDO!
I drove to Ocean City, Maryland where the skies were clear and just made it in time to see the sunset across the bay. No special equipment here just a 18-200 mm lens on my Canon 500d. I held two ND Grad filters over the lens and shot it manually. It was very clearly visible through viewfinder but the bright sun almost overwhelms tiny Venus on the sun’s disk. Still, you can …
5 June 2012
Most of USA To See Venus Transit at Sunset!
It begins at 22:09 GMT today. That is 6:09 PM EDT. Here in Maryland and over much of North America, the transit will be underway at sunset. You can look at the sun at sunset safely for a few seconds! I plan on seeing the sunset over Chesapeake Bay..if the weather holds! NASA has a good video below on why this is so historical and an important scientific event.
2 June 2012
Satellite Shortage Getting Critical
Heidi Cullen at Climate Central is one my smarter acquaintances. Her Op-Ed in the NY Times is a must read:
Unmanned Drones To Fly Into Hurricanes In August
The use of unmanned drones has been a very controversial political issue in recent months, but NOAA (NASA is funding the experiment) is planning to use them in a very useful (and non-controversial) way. They will be flying a bunch of complex instruments into hurricanes in August and September over the next 3 years. These instrument equipped drones will be able to fly for 30 hours and will drop some specially designed (by …
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.