Before I get into the severe thunderstorm outlook for upcoming days, I thought you might be interested in seeing how widespread this recent cold snap has been.  Freeze Warnings are in effect Wednesday night all the way down to Tennessee and North Carolina.  A good dozen states or more are covered (the area in blue on the map).

Weather Advisories Wednesday Night

Rain is likely Friday around here with a small chance of a thunderstorm Saturday.  However it looks like the threat of severe storms with large hail, high winds, and tornadoes will stay in the Plains.

The convective outlook from the Storm Prediction Center for Friday shows the risk area mostly in Kansas, Oklahoma, into far northern Texas.  That part of the country will be in a flow of warm and muggy air with dew points climbing into the 60s.  A low pressure system emerging from the Rockies into the Plains along with strong jet stream winds will aid the formation of violent weather.

Severe Thunderstorm Risk Area for Friday

Severe Thunderstorm Outlook for Saturday

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally, I want to bring up a sneaky weather feature that occasionally helps to develop or enhance precipitation and storms.  It is called gravity wave.  It is a rapidly moving ripple of energy with alternating up and down air motions.  It normally shows up on satellite imagery as a striped area of clouds with clear breaks between them.  Here is an example in the image below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This gravity wave train ended up producing a thunderstorm with softball size hail in parts of Texas.  We really have to watch them carefully, especially where they might intersect an existing front or boundary.  That’s usually where the big action is.  You can learn much more about this fascinating case and gravity waves in general by checking out this link from the Storm Prediction Center.  http://www.spc.noaa.gov/coolimg/gwavecb.htm

Posted under forecast, Freeze, Severe Weather, Storms

A while back when I was discussing the potential problems associated with anthropogenic global warming (AGW), I suggested that if some of the worse scenarios came to pass or became imminent, that there would be ways to combat those changes. I have often rejected the “irreversible” terminology used by many climatologists. Of course, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. It would be much better to continue the development of new technology and use less fossil fuel going into the future. But….the following are speculative thoughts about future scenarios.

Besides many of the big geo-engineering ideas I have highlighted here in the blog I have also mentioned the fact that we can take carbon dioxide out of the air. We put carbon dioxide in the air, we could take it back out (if needed). Plants already do it on a large scale quite efficiently. There are no physical laws that would prevent us from doing this. Would it be difficult? Yes. Would it be expensive? Yes. Could we do it if our lives depended on it? Yes.

One other off-beat idea I mentioned was creating ice. Much has been made of the possibility that the ice caps of the earth might melt in coming decades. If this comes to pass, we could always make ice and turn the planet cooler once again. Maybe we could let loose a fleet of floating solar powered ice machines. I am not sure exactly what form such a project would take but we know how to make ice. It would be another monumentally expensive project, but could be done none-the-less. More ice, especially in arctic areas would reflect more of the sun’s energy back into space.

Ulan Battor, Mongolia

Lo-and-behold, a recent science article mentioned making ice on a small scale to cool at least one city in the world. This idea comes from Mongolia of all places. They are apparently going to create large slabs of ice this winter in order too keep the capital city (Ulan Bator) cool during the Summer next year. They are spending $700,000 on the project. The engineers in the project say it is quite simple but one problem that could crop up is pollution. The river water they are planning on using to create huge slabs of ice during the winter might have some pollution, mainly from local gold mines. This will not affect there effort to cool the city but it might prevent the melt water from being used for personal uses. It will interesting to follow up on this story in the Spring and Summer. Hopefully we can get some pictures as well.

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As far as the weather goes this weekend, watch out on the roadways Saturday night into Sunday morning when there could be an inch or two of light snow.

Have a good weekend! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

Posted under AGW, Climate Change, Freeze, Winter Weather

The last time it was this cold so early in the month of September was back in 2007.  We had a sharp polar blast that produced a record low of 30 degrees at the Wausau Downtown Airport on September 15th of  that year.  As it turned out, temperatures never got that cold again for the rest of the month.

Last year, 2010, we had our first frost in the Wausau area on the very last day of September.  Otherwise it was a rather warm month.  I remember an early September freeze a number of years back that came so sudden that it caused the leaves of the ash trees to fall off the very next day!  What was so interesting about that was the fact that the leaves were still perfectly green.  I’ll never forget that.  The green leaves were kind of solid and stiff and you could actually hear them hit strike the ground as they fell straight down. There was no wind that morning.  It must have been such a shock to the trees that they just couldn’t take it.  Normally green ash trees turn a yellow-brownish color for a week or two before the leaves fall off.

Well, now that the background is set.  Let’s just say it, we could set a record low temperature in the Wausau area Friday morning.  The record low is 32 degrees from 1916 and we are forecasting the low around 30-31 degrees at the airport.  If this happens it will be one of only a handful of record low temperatures we’ve broke in the last 10 years in Wausau.  Some of that is probably due to global warming.  Some may be from expanded areas of buildings and pavement around the metro area which increases the urban heat island effect.

It will be interesting to see if this cold weather accelerates the fall colors.  It usually does.  You might be wondering if the cold weather and fall are setting in early?  Actually this spell looks more like an aberration than anything.  The computer models over the next two weeks generally keep a mild pattern around with temperatures at or above normal at times.  There could be a few bursts where readings actually get up toward 80 degrees again.

So I guess you can look at this cold snap as a trial run of real autumn.  It is giving you a chance to find the coats and gloves and blankets again.  Then you can set them aside for the eventual full fledged return of the cold air.

Posted under Fall, Fall Color, Freeze, Records

The cold blast of air continues to be the main theme in the weather for today and the rest of the week. It will be cold enough tonight that some patchy frost might form, but it is not a guarantee. The threat is great enough that the National Weather Service has issued a FROST ADVISORY for effective tonight into Thursday morning for Ashland, Price, Taylor, Clark, Jackson, Juneau, Adams, Wood, Portage, Waushara, Marathon and Lincoln counties.

The northeastern part of the area might not have any frost because there will be some lake effect cloudiness and some wind continuing out of the northwest. Some of the clouds might even hang around the Wausau area later tonight and thus I am forecasting a low of 34 in town. Even though I do not expect an official frost in the city, I am not going to leave any vulnerable plants outside. If we don’t have an official frost in Wausau tonight, it will likely happen Thursday night into Friday morning. We should have clear skies and light winds on Thursday night. Low in the northwoods will likely drop into the 20s. In Wausau I am forecasting 31. It will likely be the effective end of the growing season and it would break a record in Wausau. The record low on Friday is 32, set back in 1916. It is interesting to note that there was quite a wicked cold spell back in 1916 (besides just the record low on the 16th of September). In September of 1916 there was a record cold high temperature of 44 on the 15th, a record cold high temperature of 38 on the 16th (Yikes!), a record low of 32 on the 16th, a record low of 28 on the 17th, and a record low of 28 on the 18th. So if you don’t like the weather today, just be glad that you did not have to suffer through 1916. On the flip side, it was quite hot during this time of year in 1939. During September of 1939 we had record high temps in the 90s for 4 days in a row! It was 92 on the 13th, 94 on the 14th, 93 on the 15th, and 92 on the 16th

If we do get a frost in Wausau on Friday morning, it would be about 2 weeks earlier than normal. Check out this graphic to see when the first frost usually happens. For most of our area, it usually occurs between the 20th and the 26th of September. Wausau used to fall closer to this date range, but in the last couple of decades the city has grown enough to impact the date of the first frost. The Urban heat island effect is likely what makes Wausau’s first frost now occur around October 1st.

If we do have a frost on Friday then we will also have a longer time to experience official “Indian Summer”. The first frost is of course one criteria in the definition of Indian Summer. For the full definition of Indian Summer we use here at StormTrak 9, check this past blog post.

Have a good Wednesday! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

Posted under Fall, Freeze, Records, Weather History

I’ve got some not so good news for those of you with seasonal fall allergies.  A study by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and others indicates that ragweed pollen season over the past 30 years has gotten longer.  For example in Madison, it’s about 12 days longer, Minneapolis, 16 days longer, to as much as 28 days longer in Winnipeg.  The main driving force behind this is believed to be a warming climate.  Average dates of killing freezes have been pushed back as the climate changes.  While a hard freeze in fall reduces pollen production significantly, it usually doesn’t disappear until a good snow cover has developed.  The average dates of continuous snow on the ground has also slipped later into the year extending the allergy season.  Interestingly enough though, the length of ragweed pollen season has actually shrunk in southern locations like Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.  While no definitive reason is given, maybe it’s getting too hot there for ragweed to stay healthy deep into the fall.   Or perhaps it matures earlier in the season and then shrivels up in the fall.  By  the way, a ragweed plant can produce up to 1 billion pollen grains.

Common Ragweed

The American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology (AAAAI) says about 12 million Americans are impacted by fall allergies.  Besides ragweed, dust mites and mold come into play.  Of course areas that have had a wetter summer and higher humidity will have more mold problems.  They say in general a warmer climate causes plants to produce more pollen than they used too.  This is accentuated by the increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere now.  Of course plants use CO2 and sunlight to produce energy. CO2 allows plants to produce not only more pollen, but more intense pollen.  As such there are more allergens per grain of pollen than years ago in many species.

The AAAAI also suggests that easting a plethora of fresh fruit can enhance allergic reactions in some people.  The different varieties of pollens mixing together in your body can confuse the body’s immune system.  They say though, don’t stop eating fresh fruits.  The health benefits outweigh the possible side-effects.

Well, good luck if you are going through that annoying routine of sneezing, runny eyes and nose, and itchy throat right now.  I feel for you, as I get hit some as well.  Just keep thinking cold thoughts like hard frost, and snow!

Posted under Ag Weather, AGW, Allergies, Climate Change, Ecology, Environment, Fall, Freeze, Seasonal Items, Weather and Health

I had the opportunity to drive to southern Wisconsin (Milwaukee area) last Friday and return slowly and enjoy Wisconsin’s rustic roads on the way back north on Saturday. What amazed me was the extent of the destruction cause by the wind storm that struck this past Friday. There were trees down in many locations in Waushara and Waupaca counties, the worst of which was in Wausau county. People were out with chainsaws cleaning up the mess at about every other country house of farm. There were power lines down and even large branches and tree tops that had blow out into farm fields quite some distance from the nearest forest or grove of trees.

Picture by Gregg Michael of Neenah

It just goes to show how dangerous straight line winds can be. The storm did not look all that “impressive” on radar but we had some reports from southern Minnesota and the La Crosse area indicating some trees down and power outages. So when the storms entered our area and a handful of counties were under warnings I made sure to break into programming twice to warn people. It is not often that this – dangerous storms during the morning – happens during severe weather season. Seeing the post storm damage and reports of winds in excess of 70mph, I think it was the correct decision. I hope everyone remembers that it is not only tornadoes that cause damage and can kill people. Far more common are straight-line wind storms.

Wind Damage in Almond, taken by Lee Welter

Other than the huge storms on Friday, the weather conversation over the weekend focused primarily on a wet Saturday and cool temps Sunday and Monday. Then cool trend eventually led to some frost this morning. The low temps dropped to 32 in Eagle River and 30 in Land O’ Lakes. It was the first touch of frost of the Fall season. The last time we had a touch of frost was not too long ago – it was June 12th of this year, so we almost made it 3 months without frost! June 12th was the last time the mercury dropped down to 40 here in Wausau and that was the low we had this morning.

For the rest of the week, I will have plenty of time to blog about topics other than weather because not much will be happening. In fact, the weather looks just about perfect for the early to mid part of September. We should have more sun than clouds from today through Sunday and temps should steadily warm, reaching high in the mid to upper 70s from Thursday through Sunday. As of now, it looks like the next chance of rain will be next Monday. Of course, things could change a bit, because the weekend is a few days off, but as of now it is looking good. We just don’t get many perfect weeks or weekends here in Wisconsin throughout the year so you MUST be sure to make the most of it. Winter is not too far away.

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One of the “other” topics I have been following for a few years is the development of LED light bulbs. On the surface they offer great promise to help reduce our impact on the environment and maybe save a lot of money. Up until now, the problem is that they cost too much. A standard socket LED bulb sells from around $20 to about $50 on the internet. Yikes!

Still, progress continues. Researchers at the University of Florida have successfully used quantum dots to produce LED lighting and developed a process to make them much cheaper. Of course, the proof will be in the pudding a couple years down the road to see if the latest quantum dot LEDs can be made cheaper. Here is a longer article about all things LED from a lighting conference that took place recently. Almost all of the display booths at the conference were touting new LED lights or new designs (on paper/powerpoint). No one is talking much about incandescents or compact fluorescent bulbs. This is probably because many government have mandated or are threatening to mandate the end of incandescent bulbs (in order to save energy), and compact fluorescent bulbs are so…yesterday – I guess.

The one disturbing thing I found in the longer article was reference to how the Tea Party is against government mandates ending the incandescent bulbs. That in itself is not bad. I am very sympathetic to small government arguments and I would prefer that the government NOT mandate what light bulbs we have to use. What I am concerned about is that the limited government types (of which I would be classified) will toss the baby out with the bathwater. That disdain for light bulb mandates will turn into disdain for LED technology in general. This would be sad because LEDs do hold a lot of promise in saving energy and lessening our impact on the environment.

Have a good Tuesday! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

Posted under Alternative Energy, Freeze, Severe Weather, Technology, Viewer pictures

The most interesting thing to blog about today, whether you want to hear about it or not, is RECORD COLD! From the information I have gathered it looks like we broke 2 record lows and tied another across Northcentral Wisconsin this morning:

• Stevens Point 28 (old record 32 in 1906)
• Rhinelander 26 (old record 27 in 1917)
• Antigo 28 (old record 28 in 1971)

Here in Wausau we were very close to the record low. Based on the observations through 7am, it looks like the low temperature dropped to 33. The old record was 32 set back in 1906. There was some scattered frost around town so I am glad I covered my sensitive plants last night, even though I had to stay up late to do so.

No more frost through the rest of the holiday weekend, thank goodness. In fact, high temps could be around 80 by Monday so it will be feeling much more Summer-like for at least one day of the holiday weekend. The highest chances of rain will be tonight (60% chance of showers) and again late Sunday into Monday morning (40% chance of storms).

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Just a couple news updates for the rest of the blog on a couple of items I have been following through the years.

The Spirit Rover has not phoned home in over a year and mission controllers at NASA are hanging it up. It is likely that the Rover suffered serious damage from the recent Martian winter. Because it was stuck in the sand, it could not position its solar panels for maximum sunlight and the batteries just drained down (most likely). Without any internal heat, the electronics likely suffered damage. RIP Spirit, you did a good job exploring Mars.

In other news, just week after D-Wave revealed the design of their quantum computer, they now have their first (announced) customer. Lockheed Martin will purchase a quantum computer from D-Wave. This is an interesting development in the history of computing. Quantum computers have the capability of transforming the world. If Lockheed (or others who are more secretly testing the D-Wave system, like Google) have some success with the computer, I suspect there will be a mad rush to buy more – by companies and governments around the world.

Lastly, I didn’t produce a blog entry yesterday because I was gone to the Green Bay NWS media seminar. One of the more interesting facts that I learned is that the October 26-27th 2010 wind storm was NOTthe record lowest pressure ever recorded for a non-tropical weather system in the U.S. Apparently, after much searching, climate specialists found 2 Nor’easters that had lower pressure than the storm that hit the Midwest late last year.

Special notes: Our daily text messaging system and our recorded phone forecast 715-843-9250 are currently experiencing technical difficulties. These might not be restored until Monday or Tuesday of next week. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Have a good Memorial Day Weekend! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

Posted under Freeze, Records, Space, Technology, Weather History

With some frost expected in northwest Wisconsin Wednesday night and across a good chunk of the state Thursday night we are all hoping this will be the end of the cold weather for the growing season.  I ran a blog a few weeks ago about the average date of the last frost in spring in Wisconsin.  In the TV-9 viewing area this date is usually in early May in the southeast sections to right around June 1st toward the Upper Michigan border.

Thankfully the pattern does look much warmer next week with a general southwest flow in the jet stream driving summerlike air into Wisconsin.  So our chances beyond June 1st of getting frost are pretty low, I would say less than 20%.  I do remember a devastating frost on Father’s Day back in the early 1990s that severely hurt the corn crop since most of it was up already about 6 or 8 inches by that point.  I know a lot of tomato and pepper plants were lost in the area as well.

Think warm thoughts and I hope your yard is spared!

Posted under forecast, Freeze, Spring

It turns out my fears of frost were a little overblown, at least in Wausau. The official low in Wausau this morning was only 36. Many locations remained in the mid to upper 30s, while a few did record frost. Stevens Point dropped to 30, Wisconsin Dells bottomed out at 31, and Wisconsin Rapids hit 32. The temperature did not drop as far as expected across more of the area because there was a light wind during the night. If the wind had become calm, then we would have been close to record low temperatures.

It turns out I could have planted a few frost-tolerant things in my garden (like broccoli and cabbage) a few days ago, but I remind myself, it is only May 17th. As long as I get my garden in before the end of May, then the growing season is long enough to produce a good crop. Back when I was growing up, a general rule of thumb was to not plant warm weather plants like tomatoes, sweet corn, and peppers until Memorial Day weekend. Nowadays, with a bit warmer climate, and improved forecasting, we can usually plant a few days earlier in May and be reasonably confident that we will not lose plants to frost.

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Turning to a subject that I touch upon quite frequently, there is more good news on the alternative energy front. Despite worries over political and economic instability around the world, technology continues to advance and promise a cleaner greener future. My current front-runner for the most promising alternative energy – solar – made news multiple times since the last update:

• Sometimes improvements come from the most unexpected corners. A research team at MIT has used viruses to help create more efficient dye-sensitized solar cells. The viruses help align carbon nanotubes in the active layer of the solar cells. Using this method they have boosted the efficiency of this type of cell by a third.
• Another group from MIT has created a solar collection material that absorbs energy in the infrared and ultraviolet wavelengths while allowing most visible light to pass through. How could this be useful? It could go over a window, thus harvesting energy but not blocking “light” from getting through for natural interior illumination. The only problem with this technology is that it is organic, which typically has a much shorter useful lifespan than inorganic solar cells.
• Another fruitful area of research is using quantum dots to improve solar conversion efficiency. One team of scientists has found that charging the quantum dots during fabrication of solar cells could improve efficiency by 50%. The process is probably a few years away e mass manufacturing.
• Just today a headline proclaimed a new solar device that converts 95% of incoming solar radiation to useful energy. The invention will apparently use nano-antennae to capture many different wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum. The inventor says mass production is about 5 years away. I am not holding my breath on this one, because 95% conversion might not be theoretically possible given our current understanding of physics. Details in the article were scant, which makes it look more like a fundraising effort than a coming out party for new technology.

Have a fine Tuesday! Meteorologist Justin Loew

Posted under Alternative Energy, Freeze, Technology

I was shopping for plants last Thursday and I was about ready to check out with some basil, melons, and cucumbers when it dawned on me that there was a chance of frost early this week (today and tomorrow). I didn’t want to hang on to the plants for 5 or 6 days so I put a few back. I kept the frost tolerant plants such as cabbage and broccoli but even those I was reluctant to plant because at one point it looked like temps might drop into the upper 20s (which would be record territory) even in central Wisconsin. A record low is still possible in Wausau on Tuesday. The record is 28 and I am forecasting 32. The National Weather service will very likely issue another FROST ADVISORY for all of central Wisconsin for late tonight through early Tuesday morning.

So, I ended up baby-sitting all the vegetables and flowers inside. I plan on planting my broccoli and cabbage on Tuesday afternoon and buying peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, melons, etc… at the same time (to go in the ground later this week). Looking far ahead, there appears to be a small chance of frost toward the end of the month of May but it is small enough that I am going to take a risk and get all of my plants in the ground soon.

Of course, I already planted a few frost tolerant plants earlier this month – such as peas, spinach, lettuce, and onions. They are already growing.

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In other news, you know I like to keep informed of cutting edge research and quantum computing has once again made the headlines. It is a familiar company (D-Wave) making the announcement, revealing how their quantum computer achieves its quantum state. I blogged about D-Wave’s revolutionary effort back in 2007. I also had the pleasure of interviewing D-Wave’s founder Geordie Rose a couple of times. At the time of the interviews, the company was promising big things in quantum computing but did not deliver, which made many mainstream physicists skeptical. I do not know what held them up but now they are revealing the “guts” of their computer and many people are excited again. D-Wave is promising another press release soon that will really raise eyebrows. I know they have been working with Google to create a better/faster image recognition process. One possibility is that they will announce that they have beaten classic computers (server farms, basically) in some image recognition/sorting task.

What does it mean for society at large? The most commented on possibility is that D-Wave’s quantum computer could make our current computer/internet cryptographic system obsolete. The Internet currently remains secure for commerce by using 128 bit encryption. With such a large number (bits) used for encryption, it is nearly impossible for anyone without a very large supercomputer to break the security of the Internet. With a quantum computer that uses 128 bits, it would be a breeze to break encryption. It is a concern, but I suspect quantum physicists would eventually come up with a way to produce secure data transmission even in a world where quantum computers exist. Quantum computers would also be able to easily solve other special problems in mathematics like the travelling salesman or large factoring. I am unsure at this point if there would be an application in weather forecasting. Even though weather forecasting (by computer) is very complex, it is a different type of mathematical problem. My initial feeling is that weather calculations/simulations would have to be re-cast in a different mathematical form in order to take advantage of quantum computing.

Have a good Monday! Meteorologist Justin Loew.

Posted under Freeze, Technology