Complaining about the weather - 2023 edition

[Bob Schroeck]

Back on the smoke front, this morning we have what looks more like an ordinary overcast, but the haze is still heavy.

[robkelk]

Apparently, the prevailing winds have pushed the smoke as far as South Carolina. I was actually able to breathe normally outside today.

But the fires are still burning, and we've been told to expect a second wave of smoke tomorrow.

[Bob Schroeck]

Similarly we have had sunny skies here so far. I'll keep the warning in mind, though.

[classicdrogn]

Apparently, living in a very greened sub-suburb makes a much bigger difference than I expected. Driving to West Roxbury today for a medical appointment, the air in the more developed area was enough that I couldn't stop coughing. More intense local traffic doesn't help either, but I've been to that location fairly often before and not had that problem.

[classicdrogn]

Some mondo lightning this morning - even with 17 seconds between the flash and the thunder, it was strong enough to shake the house and rattle the windows, and knock one of the more precariously balanced Transformers over on my toy shelf. No power flickers though, knock on wood.

[robkelk]

It's possible to get too many alerts. Tornado warnings have been on and off and on again all afternoon (and one has touched down in southwest Ottawa)... and every time a storm front moves into another forecast area, Environment Canada sends out another alert.

At this rate, "the boy who cried wolf" effect is going to kick in.

[GethN7]

Good news: It's been raining after a lot of heat.

Bad news: It's been raining with lightning storms that have given me power outages over three times in a week.

[classicdrogn]

Still better than heat lightning without rain, especially when it's been dry. Still ruddy annoying, of course! Keep your devices charged and a flashlight to hand, I guess.

[firvulag]

So, we've had a little bit of rain here, over the last few days.  The flooding is mostly localized, but there are a few people missing.

...

At least nothing's on fire any more, I guess.

[robkelk]

We got some rain this afternoon. Including large hail. As I post this, it's still raining.

[Dartz]

So many cars about to discover the incompressibility of water

[robkelk]

Back to the wildfires... Everyone in the capital of the Northwest Territories ordered to evacuate.

The population is over 20,000. There's only one road out.

[Labster]

Meanwhile, we have a category 4 hurricane heading towards Los Angeles. I mean, it won't be Cat 4 when it gets here, because of cooler water and topography chewing it up, but it's a solid forecast of tropical storm strength when Hurricane/TS Hilary hits here. This is my first time ever in a forecast cone of uncertainty. It's so exciting!

Also that same forecast had a tropical storm centered over Barstow by Monday, which is the most bonkers thing I've seen in a forecast. Somehow a tropical storm still has cohesion over a desert past the 1-2km tall mountains? The forecast discussion said that they're expecting 2.5 inches of precipitable water aloft (which isn't a lot of PWAT honestly) but for this season, it's five standard deviations from the mean. Okay I'm convinced of climate change now.

As a meteorologist who doesn't have to drive and lives far from a waterway: this is going to be fun!

[Dartz]

Expecting an interesting Autumn here too. We've already had a pair of strange midsummer storms - that never happens. And the wettest summer ever so far, after the hottest June ever.

Last time we had a hurricane people drove to the coast to watch that thing roll in. People were swimming in it. Don't do that.


Let Mister Exxon's wild ride continue.

[Labster]

Well, the hurricane has begun to hit us here. I'm still on the edge so it's just hot and rainy.

But let's talk about the earthquakes I've been getting today! I'm only about 15 miles away so I felt the whole swarm of quakes, and they haven't stopped yet. Just a few things fell to the floor, but it's every few minutes I'm feeling another temblor. Biggest one was 5.1 -- definitely the biggest I've felt since Northridge, possibly a little stronger at my location.

Earthquake weather, I tell you.

[Dartz]

Might be the dropping or changing air pressure letting the stress in the crust just sort of pop out.

There's all sort of stuff moving. Like, megatons of storm surge water and all that.


Someone could probably do science and see if recent big storms, or shifts in atmospheric pressure can preceed earthquakes

[Labster]

Well, I survived Hurriquake 2023. I need to get a T-Shirt saying I did. There's been 25 earthquakes today, and I felt about ten of them. Two-thirds of an inch of rain, which was pretty calm and constant here -- the other side of town 5 miles away got twice the rain we did. It doubled again heading further west. Twenty miles the other way got a mere two-tenths. Tropical storms are so much smaller, and how close you are to the center really matters. And of course, on which side of the mountains; because of the storm track, the desert side of the mountains got soaked leaving a rain shadow along the coast.

Someone could probably do science and see if recent big storms, or shifts in atmospheric pressure can preceed earthquakes

Earthquake weather is a tale we like to tell ourselves, but has essentially no basis, other than smaller disturbances caused by mudslides or avalanches. I do like your theory about atmospheric pressure -- it's at least plausible, because hydrostatic balance is pretty fast, at least compared to heat or water flow.

[robkelk]

I understand that New York City got some rain today.

Hope Bob's okay.

[Bob Schroeck]

Yeah, it's been heavy rain for the last week. We're fine, although the rain was so intense at 5 AM this morning it woke me up and I thought it was the heat running.

[robkelk]

It's the day before Halloween and there's already Christmas displays in the stores it's snowing.

[classicdrogn]

That means you can have maple syrup on snow as a Halloween sweet. Well, theoretically. I don't know if even Canadian snow is actually safe to eat anymore, with a century of blowing coal smoke into the atmosphere plus whatever massive wildfires might have lifted in just the last couple of years. The full moon a couple days ago was bright little-girly pink here in the Bridgewater Triangle, hardly suitable for creating a spooky setting.

[Bob Schroeck]

I should have posted this yesterday... Saturday it hit 80-plus degrees F here. Sunday the high was 57. The previous Wednesday the low was 39. Juuust a little crazy with the temperatures here in NJ this last week...

[robkelk]

Yuck -- it's one of those forecasts.

Snow tonight, freezing rain tomorrow morning, rain tomorrow afternoon.

Good thing I'm already scheduled to work from home.

[Labster]

Hi folks... I got a Tornado Warning on my phone at 1:30 AM, in on the Southern California coast. I pull up the radar and I'll be damned if I didn't see a hook echo heading towards the other end of town. I'm just kind of upset I wasn't ready to go out and chase the thing. At least I get the lightning and thunder.

Oh damn phone just buzzed in again with a flash flood warning. Morning gets convective!

[Kilroy]

Well it is Christmas  Eve day and the ground is brown, with rain and not snow in the local forecast for the next week. I believe that makes three years running for no white Christmas.   We had a single morning with a very light dusting a few weeks ago with nothing since.
It really is disappointing.


Kilroy