weather – rich text

Dogs and cats, sleeping together!

Rich — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 04:58:11 +0000

So there’s some snow coming. Toronto’s looking at 15-25 cm (about a foot) of snow and ice pellets, Ottawa’s got 45-60 cm (about two feet) of snow coming, and I was planning on driving from Ottawa to Toronto tomorrow night. Awesome.

But what the snow does mean is that Environment Canada’s forecasters get to write the apocalyptic weather warnings that they do so well. My theory is that all of the senior meteorologists choose to stay the hell home when there’s big snow coming, so they get someone from the high-school newspaper to do the writing. Excerpts from tonight’s, italics mine:

A near-crippling snow storm with heavy snow and blowing snow as well as some ice pellets tonight and Sunday…

The developing low pressure system is moving across western Kentucky preceeded [sic] by a burgeoning area of moderate snow…

This storm track will place much of southern and eastern Ontario directly under the brunt of heavy snow…

A few claps of thunder along with bursts of very heavy snow are also likely.

The brunt of the main snow event will begin this evening in the southwest and rapidly envelop all regions east to Ottawa in the overnight hours. Copious amounts of snow as well as strong winds causing blowing snow are expected.

In addition freezing rain is possible especially near Lake Erie for a few hours overnight and Sunday morning as milder air pays a brief visit aloft. Ice pellets are also quite possible generally along and south of a line from Grand Bend to near Toronto and east to Cornwall.

This massive snow storm has the potential to cause near-paralyzing conditions as road travel on any unplowed streets may become next to impossible on Sunday.

There is a high degree of certainty with this storm as the concensus [sic] of weather model data is virtually unanimously forecasting this event.

Put down the thesaurus, guys! (I liked it better when the forecasts were written by military meteorologists.) Welp, at least I’ll get to try out my new snow tires and Sorel boots.

April is the cruelest month

Rich — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 13:23:20 +0000

Can we have spring back, please?

Today

Snow changing to rain this morning.
Local snowfall amount 2 cm.
Wind east 20 km/h.
High plus 2.

Tonight

Rain changing to snow this evening.
Snowfall amount 5 cm.
Wind east 20 km/h becoming light this evening.
Low zero.

Hurricane

Rich — Fri, 12 Aug 2005 10:59:00 +0000

A free-verse poem I found about a building hurricane:

Flat. Calm.

Ripples without crests.
Wind motion visible in smoke.

Small wavelets.
Wind felt on exposed skin.

Leaves rustle.

Large wavelets; leaves and smaller twigs in
Constant motion.

Small waves.

Dust and loose paper raised.
Small branches begin to move.

Moderate longer waves; some foam and spray.
Smaller trees sway.

Sea heaps up and foam begins to streak.

Large branches in motion; umbrella use becomes difficult.

Moderately high waves with breaking crests.
Streaks of foam.

Twigs broken from trees.
Cars veer on road.

High waves with dense foam. Wave crests start to roll over.
Considerable spray.

Light structural damage. Very high waves.

The sea surface is white and there is considerable tumbling.
Visibility is reduced. Trees uprooted.
Considerable structural damage. Huge waves.

Air filled with foam and spray.
Sea completely white with driving spray.

Visibility very greatly reduced.
Massive and widespread damage to structures.

… by Sir Francis Beaufort.

This bug might be gating, folks

Rich — Tue, 02 Aug 2005 14:03:00 +0000

From this CBC article about the jet that went off the end of the runway in Toronto today:

At mid-afternoon Tuesday, a spokesperson with the Greater Toronto Airports Authority said lightning was causing technical problems with the airport’s lightning-detection system.

I… see.

thanks for the info

Rich — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 07:56:00 +0000

CBC News: Heat wave could be start of summer-long trend

You don’t say! We should do this every year.