Riverdale, Maryland’s 800 newest citizens are starting to move in: the suburb of Washington, D.C., which is just a hailstone’s throw from the University of Maryland, is suddenly inheriting a major influx of meteorologists and their colleagues.
This newcomers are a cadre of NOAA scientists with a long history behind them, and with the opening of the new 268,762 square-foot, four-story National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction, a new era begins for the National Centers for Environmental Prediction as well as colleagues from the National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service and the Air Resources Laboratory. So, to mark the occasion David Caldwell and Louis Uccellini, back in April, awaiting a first meeting at the then-unfinished new home for NCEP and other NOAA groups, in Riverdale, Maryland.
and kick off a move-in process that will continue through September as operations shift from the 40-year-old World Weather Building in Camp Springs, Maryland, NCEP Director (and current AMS President) Louis Uccellini decided to make a gesture to his predecessors who brought NOAA’s forecasting hub to this juncture. Here’s the commemorative email he sent, which was shared throughout NCEP:
Subject: Last email from the desk of the Director of NCEP at the World Weather Building
Date: Wed, 01 Aug 2012 14:33:35 -0400
From: Dr. Louis Uccellini
To: Ron McPherson, Bill Bonner, Jim Howcroft, Norm Phillip
Ron/Bill/Jim/Norm: Tradition has it that when the NCEP Director leaves his position and shuts the lights out for the last time in Room 100 at the World Weather Building (WWB), he/she leaves a hand written letter taped inside the top drawer of their desk for the next Director. But we have a unique situation as today marks the last day the Director of NCEP resides at the WWB as I will be moving to the new NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) tomorrow.
So I have decided to write this email to you, the former NCEP Directors (Bill Bonner, Ron McPherson), the Deputy Director (Jim Howcroft) and Norm Phillips, as the last correspondence, the very last email sent from this office.I have been reflecting on the history made in the WWB from 1974 to the present and understand that much of this would not have happened without you, the previous Directors (George Cressman and Fred Shuman), and the great people that you assembled to develop and implement real-time models that would ultimately access the global observing system and provide numerical predictions that would become the basis, the rock solid foundation, for how weather and climate forecasts are made.
David Laskin wrote about the WWB and NMC/NCEP in his 1996 book, “Braving the Elements: The Stormy History of American Weather” and stated:”… a nondescript building in the town of Camp Springs, Maryland, just a stones throw off the Capital Beltway. From the outside the place looks like one of those suburban “professional complexes” where dentists and insurance salespeople set up shop. The one clue that something special happens here is an inconspicuous sign over the entrance: World Weather Building. No marble columns. No uniformed guards. No eagle clutching lightning bolts, No model of the globe. And yet, despite the absence of visible symbols, this building is as critical to our nation’s weather as the Pentagon is to our defense. For this is the headquarters of the National Meteorological Center- the innermost nerve bundle of the central nervous system of the National Weather Service…..The National Meteorologic Center is where national weather comes into focus. All the maps you see in newspapers….all those long range outlooks they flash up on the Weather Channel: they all originate here. This is where the global networks converge; this is where the megacomputers are run; this is where the nation’s weather happens: the NMC is Weather Central.”
Quite a tribute to you during your time here and a recognition of the historic importance of the WWB. Yes, history was made at the WWB! Today we run a wide spectrum of climate and weather models: 1) from short-range climate to mesoscale severe weather events, 2) from space weather forecasts to Ocean and an increasing number of Bay Models (led by NOS), 3) from individual event driven hurricane, fire weather and dispersion models (led by OAR) to an increasing number of multi model ensemble systems; all involving a coupling of many components of the Earth System and fed by over 35 satellite systems (helped along by the Joint Center for Satellite Data Assimilation) and many synoptic and asynoptic insitu data systems. We now have all the Service Centers working off the same NAWIPS workstation environment and producing products collaboratively and interactively with other Centers and Weather Forecast offices around the country with a focus on extreme events that includes severe weather, fire weather, hurricanes, and winter storms. And the people in the WWB and throughout the rest of NCEP all played their critical roles to make this happen…..
This week starts the move of the operational and administrative units to the NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Prediction. NCO has been in the NCWCP since February and has done a masterful job in wiring the place up to meet our mission needs and is presently coordinating the move. So far it is all going as smoothly as we expected and our goal remains to move all the operational units without missing one product (Another mission impossible). I want to thank all of you … for helping make this building project a reality and sticking with us as we navigated our way through and around the unexpected challenges we had to confront to bring it to a successful conclusion. I especially want to recognize David Caldwell who was with me at the very first briefing on this project, worked every step through the planning and construction start up, and is still involved as we go through the check list.
So we are ready to move. I can tell you that the smiles on the faces of the employees leaving here and moving over to the NCWCP this week says it all. They are ready! And I also have to note that the people I met on a recent visit to the ECMWF (who looked at the pictures of the NCWCP) stated they were jealous as they looked around their older building. Nevertheless, we still have some work to do to catch up, which we will, as we settle into this modern stunning facility that we all can be proud of. Thanks to you all for your support during this 13 year saga. Some pictures are attached. From this point forward, you can find me at the NCWCP, Suite 4600.
Omaha's Bemis Center, 21 June. Photo by Kathleen Franco.
Downtown Omaha, Nebraska, may not be a place you’d expect to see many rainbows, since the state is under an official drought emergency this summer. But art has a way of trumping nature at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts. The Rainbow: Certain Principles of Light and Shapes between Forms, an exhibit created by artist Michael Jones McKean, gives residents a glimpse of welcome sights from wetter times. McKean worked with irrigation and rainwater harvesting experts and atmospheric scientists to create the display, in which a dense wall of water shoots up to 100 feet into the air to create a rainbow above the building.
“There are a number of novel aspects of this project,” explains Joseph A. Zehnder, professor and chair of the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at Creighton University, who also served as a technical advisor on rain and wind climatology and on atmospherics optics for the project. “One is that the display is created using harvested rainwater. Local agricultural irrigation and rainwater harvesting companies contributed time and expertise to the project, with the hope of providing a public demonstration of currently available technologies.”
Prior to the opening, a self-contained water harvesting and storage system was built in the Bemis Center. The collected and recaptured storm water is filtered and stored in six above-ground 10,500-gallon water tanks while within the gallery a 60-horsepower pump supplies pressurized water to nine nozzles mounted to the roof. Based on atmospheric conditions, vantage point, available sunlight and the changing angle of the sun in the sky, each rainbow has a singular character and quality.
Zehnder notes that although the basics of rainbows are well understood, there are some complications that arise with providing them on demand. “There are variations in the hue and intensity of the rainbow that are related to the water drop size and density,” he explains. “The drop sizes need to be sufficiently large in order for the internal reflection and refraction of sunlight to occur. Scattering from smaller drops is the wavelength independent Mie scattering so the color separation doesn’t occur.”
McKean began experimenting with manmade rainbows in 2002 and in 2008 started researching the logistics of creating a rainbow over the Bemis Center. In 2010 he started a partial test of the rainbow in Omaha, with the full test last October. “The rainbow is a reminder of a constant universal—something forever, simultaneously contemporary and ancient,” comments McKean. “In the face of our earthbound landscape of shapes and forms, of geologic, evolutionary, archeological timescales, the rainbow is a kind of perfection, our oldest image.”
Even if artists can make their own rainbows, weather still has its say. Because of the dry summer, the Bemis Center is only showing the exhibit on select occasions, with scheduling twenty-four hours in advance. To find out when the rainbow will be on, check here or the Bemis Facebook page. There is also a free mobile app that can be downloaded to Apple and Android phones, which will notify users when the next rainbow will take place and also includes information about the artist and the project.
The still-developing field of attribution science examines specific weather events and short-term atmospheric patterns in a broader, longer-term climate context. In such research, communication is key; it’s vital to understand exactly what questions are being asked. A case in point is an article in the July issue of BAMS. “Explaining Extreme Events of 2011 from a Climate Perspective” gives long-term context to some of the significant weather events of 2011 featured in the new State of the Climate, which is also part of the July BAMS.
The authors write:
One important aspect we hope to help promote …is a focus on the questions being asked in attribution studies. Often there is a perception that some scientists have concluded that a particular weather or climate event was due to climate change whereas other scientists disagree. This can, at times, be due to confusion over exactly what is being attributed. For example, whereas Dole et al. (2011) reported that the 2010 Russian heatwave was largely natural in origin, Rahmstorf and Coumou (2011) concluded it was largely anthropogenic. In fact, the different conclusions largely reflect the different questions being asked, the focus on the magnitude of the heatwave by Dole et al. (2011) and on its probability by Rahmstorf and Coumou (2011), as has been demonstrated by Otto et al. (2012). This can be particularly confusing when communicated to the public.
So the new attribution paper in BAMS strives to answer a very specific questions–a series of them, as it turns out, since the paper is actually a collection of a number of studies by different teams, representing several of the cutting-edge approaches to researching attribution in rapid response to the extreme weather. Most of the authors, but not all, seek to answer questions about how global climate change changes odds that extreme events might occur.
Last week, NOAA held a briefing to discuss both the State of the Climate and the new BAMS article. Two coauthors of the article, Tom Peterson of NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center and Peter Stott of the Met Office Hadley Centre, discussed the answers they found. They noted that in some cases, such as the rainfall that caused flooding in Thailand, there was no connection between human activities and the extreme weather. But other events exhibited a clear human influence that increased the possibility of that event occurring. One example is the prolonged heat wave in Mexico and the southwestern United States, which was the region’s hottest and driest growing season on record by a significant margin. The steamy temperatures were connected to the La Niña that was prominent last year, and the study found that such a heat wave is 20 times more likely in La Niña years today than it was in 1960. As the coauthors noted in the briefing, the answer might be completely different in years without a La Niña , pointing out the importance of context–and understanding the questions being asked–in this study.
The State of the Climate itself documents the weather extremes of the recent past and give them context in the historical record. The 282-page peer-reviewed report, compiled by 378 scientists from 48 countries around the world, also provides a detailed update on global climate indicators and other data collected by environmental monitoring stations and instruments on land and ice, at sea, and in the sky. It used 43 climate indicators to track and identify changes and overall trends to the global climate system. These indicators include greenhouse gas concentrations, temperature of the lower and upper atmosphere, cloud cover, sea surface temperature, sea level rise, ocean salinity, sea ice extent, and snow cover. Each indicator includes thousands of measurements from multiple independent datasets.
Among the highlights of this year’s SOC:
Warm temperature trends continue: Four independent datasets show 2011 among the 15 warmest since records began in the late nineteenth century, with annually-averaged temperatures above the 1981–2010 average, but coolest on record since 2008. The Arctic continued to warm at about twice the rate compared with lower latitudes. On the opposite end of the planet, the South Pole recorded its all-time highest temperature of 9.9°F on December 25, breaking the previous record by more than 2 degrees.
Greenhouse gases climb: Major greenhouse gas concentrations, including carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide, continued to rise. Carbon dioxide steadily increased in 2011 and the yearly global average exceeded 390 parts per million (ppm) for the first time since instrumental records began. This represents an increase of 2.10 ppm compared with the previous year. There is no evidence that natural emissions of methane in the Arctic have increased significantly during the last decade.
Arctic sea ice extent decreases: Arctic sea ice extent was below average for all of 2011 and has been since June 2001, a span of 127 consecutive months through December 2011. Both the maximum ice extent (5.65 million square miles on March 7, 2011) and minimum extent (1.67 million square miles, September 9, 2011) were the second smallest of the satellite era.
Ozone levels in Arctic drop: In the upper atmosphere, temperatures in the tropical stratosphere were higher than average while temperatures in the polar stratosphere were lower than average during the early 2011 winter months. This led to the lowest ozone concentrations in the lower Arctic stratosphere since records began in 1979 with more than 80 percent of the ozone between 11 and 12 miles altitude destroyed by late March, increasing UV radiation levels at the surface.
Sea surface temperature and ocean heat content rise: Even with La Niña conditions occurring during most of the year, the 2011 global sea surface temperature was among the 12 highest years on record. Ocean heat content, measured from the surface to 2,300 feet deep, continued to rise since records began in 1993 and was record high.
Ocean salinity trends continue: Continuing a trend that began in 2004, and similar to 2010, oceans were saltier than average in areas of high evaporation, including the western and central tropical Pacific, and fresher than average in areas of high precipitation, including the eastern tropical South Pacific, suggesting that precipitation is increasing in already rainy areas and evaporation is intensifying in drier locations.
The report also provides details on a number of extreme events experienced all over the globe, including the worst flooding in Thailand in almost 70 years, drought and deadly tornado outbreaks in the United States, devastating flooding in Brazil and the worst summer heat wave in central and southern Europe since 2003.
Herbert Riehl, founder of the atmospheric sciences department at Colorado State.
The July issue of BAMS features an article by John Lewis, Matthew Fearon, and Harold Klieforth on the legacy of Herbert Riehl, who has been known by his colleagues as “the father of tropical meteorology.”
For most of his career, the home base of Riehl’s great tropical legacy was not in the tropics, however, but first at the University of Chicago and then at Colorado State University, where he founded the Department of Atmospheric Science in 1962. Riehl had been eager to leave Chicago, where merger of departments represented a change to a philosophy less welcoming toward his traditional synoptic-based approach to meteorology. But he also cited personal reasons to want to resettle in Colorado: his daughter benefitted from the drier climate to recover from pneumonia. Riehl spent 1960-61 as a visiting professor in CSU’s civil engineering department, which he then joined initially before starting his own department.
The Department, which offers masters and doctoral degrees, has grown from an initial six faculty to nineteen today with academic and research programs in areas ranging from weather systems to climate dynamics to atmospheric chemistry.
This week (13-14 July 2012) the Department of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University will celebrate its 50th anniversary with a conference, banquet, and open house in Fort Collins, Colorado. Information about the anniversary celebration, along with a timeline of historical events, can be found at http://www.atmos.colostate.edu/anniversary/anniversaryHistory.php.
The department’s 50th Anniversary Conference on July 13 will feature invited talks by alumni: Mark DeMaria, PhD ’83; Kevin Knupp, PhD ’85; Robert Rauber, PhD ’85; Steve Ackerman, PhD ’87; Thomas Peterson, PhD ’91; Susan van den Heever, PhD ’01; Timothy Lang, PhD ’01; Katherine Straub, PhD ’02; Kevin Gurney, PhD ’04; and Gavin McMeeking, PhD ’08. The luncheon program will be presented by Nolan Doesken, Colorado State Climatologist, and will be followed by a poster session featuring research by former and current students, staff, faculty, and friends of the Department. The 50th Anniversary Banquet in the evening will feature a presentation by alumnus James Fleming ’73, entitled “The Emergence of Atmospheric Science”. This presentation highlights the deep historical roots of atmospheric science — an interdisciplinary field that emerged in the 1960s at the confluence of new ideas, new technologies, and new ways of working together. As Dr. Fleming notes, “Standing on the shoulders of giants can be enlightening, fun — and sometimes risky.” CSU Atmospheric Sciences building, 1960s. CSU Atmospheric Sciences building now.
The best-selling title in the AMS bookstore is The AMS Weather Book: The Ultimate Guide to America’s Weather, by Jack Williams. Its detailed, full-color illustrations display the unique style that Williams developed during his time at USA Today, the newspaper that perfected the art of the infographic, and those images have proven to be so popular that the AMS has released a CD exclusively featuring them. The Weather, Illustrated: Graphics from The AMS Weather Book (available to order here) features more than 100 of the book’s figures, covering a range of atmospheric phenomena including jet streams, polar air masses,wet and dry microbursts, gravity waves, and Earth’s energy budget. There are also graphics about other aspects of meteorology, such as instrumentation and forecasting. By presenting meteorological concepts with images that are both accessible and stylish, the CD can be a valuable educational tool whether utilized in tandem with the book or on its own. A sample image from The Weather, Illustrated.
In an unseasonable lowering of temperatures last Thursday in Washington, D.C., both administration and Congress pulled back from catastrophic threats of furloughing thousands of National Weather Service employees this summer. The fact that NWS had defied Congress by reassigning funds to cover shortfalls no longer seems to be a reason to make the summer miserable for agency employees and the public. All parties involved are cooperating toward more measured solutions.
These days, any lowering of tensions in a politically explosive dispute is rare enough to warrant further investigation. In this case, it turns out there’s a physical cause behind the judicious political outcome. AMS Policy Program Director Bill Hooke trenchantly noted the significance of the location of the House of Representatives hearing at which Congress considered option of massive NWS furloughs: a “cramped, windowless room”, as reported by Government Executive. Hooke contrasted the intimacy of the setting with the “cavernous” hearing rooms one normally sees in televised proceedings on the Hill. He writes on his blog, Living on the Real World,
The former, more intimate settings force recognition by all parties that “we – those of us in this room – we’re in this together.” They encourage the behavior and actions apparently seen yesterday which balance fixing the problem as well as the blame.
It is ironic that at the very time when Congress resorts to the old-fashioned face-to-face method of communication to resolve a problem, some in Congress are moving to restrict scientists’ ability to communicate face to face. We’re referring to an amendment to the Postal Service Act that was approved by voice vote in the Senate in April stating, among other things, that
government agencies would not be able to sponsor employees’ attendance at more than one conference per fiscal year sponsored by any given external organization
presence at conference abroad would be limited to 50 (domestically-based) employees of any one agency
funding for any single conference cannot exceed $500,000.
Post online quarterly justification and itemizations of all conference spending.
Post online all minutes, presentations, and other documentation of conferences attended by government employees.
Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma introduced the amendment (S.Amdt.2060) in response to recent revelations of seemingly lavish spending by the General Services Administration at a Las Vegas conference. Coburn and the amendment’s co-sponsors believe that there are abuses of the use of travel and conference funding throughout the Federal government and that transparency and limits will enable better oversight and reduce waste. Coburn’s office has been aiming to reduce conference expenditures to 80 percent of 2010 levels.
However, scientists and others say the proposed rules will do far more than limit excesses. Some organizations (including AMS) sponsor multiple specialized conferences, each of which appeals to different offices within single government agencies. Others have very large conferences (think the 20,000 plus attending the American Geophysical Union’s week-long Fall Meeting) that attract huge contingents of government scientists and educators for multiple days and presentations. The AGU, which urges its members to write to Congress, explains that
Government attendance at scientific meetings not only fosters collaboration and future partnerships between government scientists and academia and industry, but the collaboration and exchange of ideas also avoids duplicative scientific efforts and stimulates new concepts. While it is extremely important to eliminate wasteful government spending, Congress should consider ways to avoid excesses that will not also inadvertently damage the United States’ scientific enterprise.
Meanwhile this month the American Society of Association Executives sent an open letter to Congress to oppose the amendment. ASAE explained to its members,
while there may be a need for more transparency and oversight for government sponsored conferences and travel, there is a legitimate need for government employees to attend private educational conferences in order to work with the private sector on best practices and shaping public policy. Most members of Congress have understood and support this position….Senator Coburn’s office has indicated they are open to modifications, but they have not yet shared any amended language. In addition, in some meetings a few members of Congress have questioned why federal employees cannot participate in meetings through Skype or teleconference. We share with these offices the value of face-to-face meetings and how important in-person collaboration can be on so many issues, from food safety to national defense to low-income housing and many others.
Indeed, scientists—despite being stereotyped as non-communicators for years for staring at their feet when talking to nonscientists at parties and burying their heads in their computers in their offices–are actually very dependent on the face-to-face interactions at conferences, large and small. These days, e-mail and scientific journals help keep everyone up-to-date, but conferences are a chance to exchange ideas, form collaborations, and prevent larger wastes of effort, duplication, and fantastical hopes that can ensue when scientists hole up in their labs for too long. Science is a marketplace of ideas: pet theories can become blind alleys unless they are short-circuited by the dose of reality that a public presentation forces on investigators. In other cases the clash of opposing ideas festers unless face-to-face communication is possible, opening up opportunities for collaborative solutions. Conferences are much more than sitting in a room watching a presentation that could be delivered over the internet.
ASAE has a great tip-sheet on the value of meetings. It points out that in business, the health of companies depends on travel and personal interaction with clients. Given that science is the engine of innovation in an increasingly technologically dependent world, it’s safe to say that the nation’s long-term economic and environmental health will continue to need busy scientists–including government scientists–to get out of their offices and into conferences together.
Much of the country is feeling the heat this week at the official start of summer, with temperatures reaching triple digits in many areas. According to National Weather Service Acting Deputy Director Steven Cooper, heat is the most overlooked weather hazard with thousands of outdoors working suffering from heat exhaustion and heat stroke during the summer months. In a campaign to prevent heat illness and deaths, the NWS collaborated with the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to spread the word on heat safety. OSHA has been reaching out through training sessions, public service announcements, and media events to educate the public on the seriousness of heat illness.
In a June 20th teleconference aimed at television and radio meteorologists and reporters, Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis noted the invaluable role that broadcasters play in getting out information. She relayed the three critical words to include in their broadcasts: Water, Rest, and Shade. “This is a vital public service,” she commented. “Television and radio meteorologists and weather reporters can speak directly to outdoor workers as well as employers who need to be educated on keeping their employees safe on the job.”
David Michaels, assistant secretary of Labor for OSHA, noted that now is the critical time to get this information out since people have not yet acclimated to the heat, making it a particularly dangerous time. He commented that training workers to recognize the signs of heatstroke is as important as educating employers to provide regular breaks and access to water. Acting quickly at the first signs of heat exhaustion—such as headache, nausea, dizziness—can prevent more serious consequences, like heat stroke, which can involve confusion, fainting, or seizures.
OSHA has developed a new smartphone App, the OSHA Heat Safety Tool, that is now available and can be downloaded here. The App allows workers and supervisors to calculate the heat index for their worksite and displays a risk level and users receive reminders about the protective measures that should be taken at that risk level.
As the agencies continue to develop new ways to keep outdoor workers safe they urge the weather community to not only spread the word in their broadcasts but also through personal Web sites, Twitter, and Facebook. Michaels encourages the use of the materials on the OSHA Web site, noting the message is one that can be used by anyone to raise awareness and promote heat illness prevention.
The First Conference on Atmospheric Biogeosciences last month in Boston was introduced to broaden the scope of the long-running AMS Conference on Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, now at its 30th meeting. Together, the joint specialty meetings brought in a record number of nearly 200 attendees. According to Ankur Desai, Chair of the AMS Committee on Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, this first joint meeting attracted a whole new audience, with many attendees experiencing their first AMS conference of any kind. Loretta J. Mickley, atmospheric chemist, member of the Board on Atmospheric Biogeosciences, and a conference co-chair, was one of them. “The joint meeting promised to bring together scientists from a range of disciplines,” Mickley comments. “I found the mix of issues enriching.”
The recently initiated AMS Board on Atmospheric Biogeosciences, chaired by Elizabeth Pattey, worked to broaden the focus of the Agricultural and Forest Meteorology meeting, by bringing in the atmospheric chemistry and ecology communities. The meeting featured presentations over four days, covering aspects of the dynamic exchanges occurring at the interface between the atmosphere and the Earth’s surface, such as canopy transport and dispersion, the fate of environmental mercury, and methane emissions from managed and unmanaged landscapes. According to Desai, it turned out to be a great fit. “It was clear from the beginning that there is a natural partnership between the two communities. We sat right at the intersection of where micrometeorology met macroecology.”
Ian Strachan, co-chair of conference and member of the AMS Committee on Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, agrees, noting that by infusing a rich tradition of meetings that goes back to the 1950s with joint sessions from the Board brought these communities together in a way that allowed attendees to explore new connections and avenues of research. Pattey, points out how the smaller venue was ideal for these types of interactions. “By integrating members in a more intimate setting, it opens a new area of direction, allowing collaborations and ideas that are important in establishing stronger ties within and between the two groups,” she comments.
Strachan noted how the sessions also provided an opportunity for students to present their work at a major venue, many for the first time. And according to the chairs, the significant number of talks (~40) and posters (~20) presented by graduate students points to atmospheric biogeosciences as a strong emerging field.
With the positive feedback from attendees, the committee and conference chairs are already discussing another joint meeting. “We plan to continue the tradition from here, bringing in scientists from even more disciplines to add to the diversity of research that was presented at this meeting,” concludes Desai.
There aren’t many reasons to consider a volcanic eruption a positive event, but if results from recent research by Amato Evan of the University of Virginia are confirmed, residents of hurricane-prone areas, at least, may have a new reason to welcome volcanoes. Evan studied the effects of two major volcanic events–the 1982 discharge of El Chichón and Mount Pinatubo’s eruption in 1991–on Atlantic hurricane activity. He found that hurricane frequency and intensity both decreased by about 50% in the year following the eruptions, as compared to the year preceding the eruptions. Smaller decreases were still detected two and three years after the eruptions.
The finding is not entirely surprising. Major volcanic eruptions can expel large amounts of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere; the gas then reacts with water to form sulfuric acid aerosols, which reflect light and absorb radiation, cooling tropical ocean waters while warming the lower stratosphere. The combination of these changes would be expected to dampen the frequency, duration, and power of hurricanes, which thrive on the temperature contrast between the sea surface and the atmosphere high above.
Evan’s study (subscription only) runs into complications that will need to be addressed before the volcano-hurricane link is accepted. For instance, both the El Chichón and Mount Pinatubo eruptions were also followed by strong El Niño events, which by themselves are expected to suppress hurricane activity. (On the other hand, some research suggests that El Niños can be caused by volcanic eruptions.) Further study of the dynamics in play is necessary.
Convincing people on the coasts that hurricanes themselves are a positive force in their lives may be a bit more difficult. At the annual Governor’s Hurricane Conference in Florida last week, however, attendees looked back at the 20-year legacy of 1992’s Hurricane Andrew with mixed feelings. While it is still the costliest disaster in the state’s history, the storm brought about many significant positive changes. For one, the state government revised emergency management funding so that each county could have a full-time emergency manager on staff. The institutionalization of emergency plans and outreach to residents has paid off repeatedly in subsequent hurricanes. Hurricane Andrew also led to stiffer enforcement of building codes and rethinking of the ways buildings must withstand high winds.
All in all, the silver lining of disaster isn’t great consolation, but the conference, like Evan’s research, gives hope for continued improvement in hurricane forecasting, preparedness, and response.
Rick Knabb has been named the new director of NOAA’s National Hurricane Center. He replaces outgoing director Bill Read and begins June 4, days after the official start of the six-month Atlantic hurricane season on June 1.
Well-known as The Weather Channel’s “hurricane expert” for the last two hurricane seasons, Knabb is returning to familiar territory. He was a senior hurricane specialist from 2005 to 2008, and the Center’s science operations officer beginning in 2001. Rick Knabb, the new director of NOAA’s National Hurricane Center.
“I’m ready to reunite with the talented staff at the National Hurricane Center and to work with all of our partners to prepare everyone for the next hurricane,” said Knabb. “Personal preparedness will be critically important, including for my own family and home.”
Born just outside of Chicago, Knabb grew up in Coral Springs, Florida, near Fort Lauderdale, and in Katy, Texas in suburban Houston. He earned a bachelor’s degree in Atmospheric Science from Purdue University and holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. in Meteorology from Florida State University.
Knabb left the Hurricane Center in Miami and became deputy director of the Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC) in Honolulu, Hawaii, for a year before arriving at The Weather Channel. The CPHC oversees tropical cyclone forecasts and warnings from 140° west longitude westward to the International Dateline, including all of the Hawaiian Islands.
A member of the AMS, Knabb also serves on the AMS Board for Operational Government Meteorologists. He has published numerous papers in AMS and other scientific journals and has given presentations on hurricanes and tropical weather at AMS and related conferences. His expertise in communicating has been honed these last two years at The Weather Channel.
“Rick personifies that calm, clear, and trusted voice that the nation has come to rely on,” says NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco. “Rick will also lead our hurricane center team and work closely with federal, state and local emergency management authorities to ensure the public is prepared to weather the storm.”
