You are browsing the archive for February 2023 - Dan's Wild Wild Science Journal.
16 February 2023
The Secret Behind Severe Thunderstorm Watch #33
NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center issued a Severe Thunderstorm Watch Wednesday afternoon, but this one was special. Severe Thunderstorm Watch #33 for parts of Oklahoma and North Texas was issued by NOAA’s Elizabeth Leitman. It was the FIRST NOAA watch issued by a woman at the SPC. Elizabeth Leitman has wanted to have this job since she was in middle school. Atmospheric physics is hard, but she did it and I …
14 February 2023
Going Viral Is A Pain
Last week I saw the news about this balloon from China passing over Montana, and when the Defense Department said it was from China, I thought, let’s see if it was! Turns out NOAA has a numerical weather model called the NOAA-HYSPLIT which will backward forecast (based on what the winds aloft were) to show you where the air over you now was a few days ago. I tend to …