Thursday, November 12, 2015 9:53 am Everybody talks about atmospheric rivers. Atmospheric river here, atmospheric river there. And while the “atmospheric river” term is certainly useful and is used in scientific literature, it also comes across as a bit of a euphemism. It sounds so nice and tranquil, like a stream flowing through the heavens, […]
Why Did Yemen and Socotra Just Get Hit By Consecutive Tropical Cyclones?
Saturday, November 7, 2015 2:13 pm Less than a week ago, Cyclone Chapala slammed into Socotra, a small Yemeni Island some 150 miles east of the Horn of Africa, and Yemen, a small country on the southwestern tip of the Arabian Peninsula currently embroiled in a brutal civil war, becoming the first hurricane-force cyclone to hit […]
Snow Arriving Right On Time For Snoqualmie Pass
Wednesday, November 4, 2015 6:02 pm A view of foggy Snoqualmie Pass from Chair 2, Alpental. Credit: ME! When I talk about snow in the Cascades, I often tend to focus on Snoqualmie Pass. This is probably because this is where I have skied most of my life (particularly Alpental), but Snoqualmie Pass is also […]
The First Flooding of The Season!
Thursday, October 29, 2015 4:59 pm Record flooding in Mt. Rainer National Park, November 2006. Credit: National Park Service For some reason, the weather always seems to get dramatically stormier as soon as we switch from October into November. The weather could be fine for trick-or-treating, and then whammo! November rolls around, and there are more fallen […]
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An Overview of Hurricane Patricia And Its Relationship To El Nino
Saturday, October 24, 2015 8:09 pm Visible satellite image of Hurricane Patricia at record intensity approaching the Western Mexico Coast. Taken October 23, 2015. Credit: NASA Terra/MODIS Satellite Patricia was the deepest cyclone ever recorded in the Western Hemisphere. Deeper than Wilma, deeper than Katrina, deeper than Camille, and far deeper than Sandy (all these storms […]
What Was the 1997-1998 El Niño Like?
Saturday, October 17, 2015 4:01 pm Beach erosion by Pacifica, California due to storms during the 1997-1998 El Niño event. Credit: USGS With all of this talk about the “Godzilla” El Niño of 2015, it’s important to remember that an event of this magnitude is not unprecedented. Back during the 1997-1998 winter, we saw the largest El Niño on […]
Why Are Our Evergreens Turning Brown?
Thursday, October 15, 2015 3:52 pm Every autumn, our beloved deciduous trees shed their leaves, creating an annual economic boom for children everywhere as parents and neighbors pay them the proverbial quarter to rake excess leaves off their lawns. Of course, once these upstart entrepreneurs have reaped the monetary rewards of their labor, they get […]
The Tragedy of Climate Misinformation
Wednesday, September 23, 2015 3:52 pm Albuquerque Tea Party, April 2009 Global warming deniers come in all shapes and sizes. Some are quite bold in their statements, denying any reasonable scientific claim, and instead claiming that global warming is a ‘socialist scam.’ Others are more subtle, claiming that evidence […]
Will Hurricane Oho Impact the Pacific Northwest?
Tuesday, October 6, 2015 3:29 pm A tower atop Campbell Hall, Western Oregon University collapsing under the 100+ mph winds of the Columbus Day Storm. Credit: Wes Luchau, Statesman Journal The Pacific Northwest has never gotten hit by a hurricane and never will. Our waters are simply too cold to sustain a tropical system. For a […]
Historic Flooding in South Carolina
Monday, October 5, 2015 2:49 pm The Pacific Northwest is no stranger to flooding. I believe that Washington has had the most federal disaster declarations of any state, which may be surprise you due to our seemingly-mundane weather. But we get these massive floods from time to time, and we also have a tendency to get […]