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20 July 2018
A Space and History Lesson on the 49th Anniversary of the Moon Landing
It was 49 years ago today that Apollo 11 landed on the Moon, and while I remember it vividly, I often think about those who were born after that event. Can they truly imagine the wonder of it? If you’re under 50, you grew up in a world where people walking on the Moon was a part of our history and I know you appreciate the event, but likely not …
19 April 2018
An April Sizzle in London
It was an April day to remember in old London. The UK Met office reported a temperature in St. James’s Park in central London today of 25.7° C. That is a very warm day for the UK in July or August and this was the hottest April day in London since 1949. Even in North Wales, at Gresford, the temperature reached 25° C (77°F). The reason for the heat is …
21 January 2018
Visitors to Our National Parks Deserve the Unvarnished Truth about History and Science
Note: The following is a guest post by Brian Ettling. It’s from his own blog, and I’m indebted to him for allowing me to share it here. I met Brian briefly at the AGU Science meeting in San Francisco a few years ago, and what he has to say is important. “A man or woman could hardly ask for a better way to make a living than as a seasonal …
18 January 2018
2017 Was Another Year of Amazing Heat. It’s not Natural, and It IS the Greenhouse Gases
NASA and NOAA both announced their global temperature results for 2017 today. NASA says it was the second warmest year on record and NOAA which does the analysis slightly differently came up with the 3rd hottest. Interestingly, if you remove the impacts of El Nino and La Nina, 2017 was THE hottest on record (see below). Forest Vs. Trees There are only three things that affect Earth’s temperature: Incoming radiation …
21 December 2017
The Cosmos Lost Carl Sagan 21 Years Ago Today
His books live on. They inspire new generations of scientists and will for decades to come. If you have not read Demon-Haunted World, then buy it. Buy two more copies and give them to a smart young student for Christmas. Just doing that may change their world. It just might change everyone’s world.
14 November 2017
Attribution Study Shows Hurricane Harvey Floods Becoming Much More Likely
Check out this paper in PNAS today. When the subject of hurricane experts comes up, there are two names that come into the mind of nearly every meteorologist: Kerry Emanuel and Chris Landsea. There are a lot of others, but these two have published a lot of research that gets sourced frequently. Today Kerry Emanuel has what can be called an attribution study on Hurricane Harvey. These studies look at how …
3 November 2017
New Climate Report- Humans Are Warming The Planet; There’s No Convincing Evidence for ANY Other Cause
The 4th U.S. Climate Assessment is HERE. A summary is here. Here are some key findings. I want to highlight what I think is the key finding: This assessment concludes, based on extensive evidence, that it is extremely likely that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases, are the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century. For the warming over the last century, there is no …
14 September 2017
It’s Time for a 21st Century Hurricane Scale
Most folks are familiar with the Saffir Simpson hurricane scale and while it’s very useful, it also has some drawbacks. It’s greatest attribute is that the public understands it, but I’m not alone among meteorologists who think the time has come to replace it. We need a new scale that will better indicate the destructive potential of a tropical cyclone, and there are some good candidates out there. The main …
19 April 2017
Science: “An Exercise in Finding What’s True”
Neil de Grasse Tyson’s video below is a must watch. His quote that “Science in an entire exercise in finding what is true”, is similar to another quote that I’ve often repeated from Richard Feynman: “Science is what we do to keep from lying to ourselves.” Watch the video and then share it.
28 March 2017
The Fake Climate Debate and The Real One
I just finished reading a paper by Michael Mann, Stefan Rahmstorf et.al in Nature Reports today that is getting some deserved press attention. It’s rather complicated (OK, for non-atmospheric science geeks, it’s a brick) but in plain language, it indicates that the warming of the climate is doing what many of my fellow forecasters have been suspecting for quite some time: changing the upper-level wind flow and therefore changing our …
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.