Drudge was linking to another Northeast Due for Big Hurricane story tonight. In it, along with AccuWeather quotes, was one from a Plymouth State professor, Dr. Lourdes Aviles.
I read it and got upset pretty quickly.
I read your quote from the AP:
Lourdes Aviles, a Plymouth State University assistant meteorology professor, said Reeves’ forecast sounds right. That New England hasn’t had a strong hurricane in 50 years could signal the region’s luck is running out, she said.
I would expect this from a layman, but I am disappointed to see a meteorologist say this. As far as I know, there is no memory in climatology. 50, 100, 1000 years – what difference does it make?
The trouble is, you help reinforce this false ‘overdue’ notion that is being hyped.
It didn’t take long before she wrote back. What had been anger toward her comments quickly turned around.
I have written the AP, hoping a correction will be published, though those seldom come close to undoing the damage.
I actually never said that. I made a point to mention to the reporter that talked to me on the phone to say that there was no way to know if such a strong hurricane would hit us this year or in 10 years or in 50 years. I said that because of the climatology, it has happened in this region and it will happen again, but I never said that it will happen this year because we are due. The reporter just heard what wanted to hear. He never mentioned Reeves name to me and I tried over and over to repeat to him that this is not how it works.
This really concerns me because this article has gotten more exposure than I thought it would get and it bothers me that it appears that I am going with the hype, when I am not.
Never believe that all quotes are exact. The report had a conversation with me and that was it. He paraphrased what he believed I was saying, instead of writing what I said. In fact, what he said I agreed with was the fact that the Long Island, Rhode Island, Eastern Massachusetts coast was more exposed than the rest of New England, but the way he wrote it, it seemed like he was saying that I agreed with everything that Reeves said. I also just realized that the article that you are pointing to is from AP and it is based on an article written by a local reporter of a small Dover, NH newspaper.
In fact, the way I see that the media works, I am wondering if Reeves actually said what the newspapers are saying he said
What Hath AccuWeather Wrought
I was scrutinizing Drudge last night when I saw the headline.
I began to get upset. Then, I read AccuWeather’s release, which was headlined:
AccuWeather.com Warns That “Weather Disaster of Historic Proportions” Could Strike as Early as This Year
The release went on to quote Joe Bastardi, one of AccuWeather’s meteorologists as saying:
That’s like saying a slot machine is overdue because it hasn’t paid out in a while. In statistics, the likelihood of a 100 year event doesn’t increase just because you’ve gone 99 years without seeing one.
I went to the weather bulletin board where I sometimes post and left this:
I read the AccuWeather release and my blood boiled. As far as I know, there’s no such thing as “overdue” in statistics. I’m assuming all their meteorologists, including Joe Bastardi, took statistics courses.
When people come up to me in the supermarket and say we hype the weather – they’re talking about stuff like this.
What AccuWeather missed – the real story – is, a Hurricane of ’38 scenario would create a civil catastrophe before it struck! Though they mention Providence as the storm’s focal point, the center actually struck nearly 100 miles west, in Milford, Connecticut.
The biggest damage was that far east because it was no longer a classic tropical system. First, it was moving at better than 60 mph (I’m doing this off the top of my head – allow a little leeway). It had also been over colder water and was probably transitioning to extratropical.
How would we warn for a storm which went from the Bahamas to New England in about a day, and whose damage would be so far east of the center? Hurricane Warnings from Atlantic City, NJ to Portland, ME? It boggles the mind.
Would we evacuate all of New England? Could we? Where would they go?
As it is, on a Sunday evening the Mass Pike backs up for miles at the I-84 exit. I-95 through most of Eastern Connecticut is 2-lanes in each direction, and the area just east of New Haven will be under construction for much of the next decade. That’s without all of Boston and Providence heading west.
But, back to AccuWeather. Is this like yelling fire in a crowded theater? I don’t know. I certainly wouldn’t have put out the statement they put out, but that’s their choice to make.
I believe they’re honorable people. Joel Meyers certainly has a long and storied reputation and has been honored for his contributions to the public’s well being and safety.
I know folks at AccuWeather read this. I would like to see Joel personally revisit this particular statement. If this is how he really feels, fine.
My hope is, he’ll provide more specifics and less hyperbole.
So, there you have it. Yes – New England is vulnerable, but no more vulnerable today than it was last year at this time.
We need solid action to prepare, not hyperbole and scare tactics.
Good Day To Be Me
I’ll start with an admission. This won’t be my most exciting of entries. It wasn’t an exciting day.
It was a good day… and an unusual day. I had two meals with two friends. I eat dinner every night, but the fact I had lunch at all was out of the ordinary.
Lunch was with my friend Josh. publisher of a string of weekly newspapers.
I woke up ‘early,’ around 11:00 AM, driving to New Haven at 12:45 PM. Today was a day with astounding weather. It got over 60° at my house and well into the 50°s in New Haven (closer to Long Island Sound). For mid-February in New England, this was a bonus day!
Normally, in February, I’d park in the garage under his office building. Today I drove to the TV station, parked in our lot and hoofed it the five or six blocks under the Federal Building and past the New Haven Green.
The streets were crawling with people. It was like a spring day and anyone with any kind of pent up winter blues was outside.
The happiest person I saw was the hot dog vendor on Church Street, outside the (usually unoccupied) WVIT – New Haven studio. I’m not sure if the hot dog guy’s out there year round, but if he is, he can’t be this busy most days.
Josh and I had lunch at Basta, an Italian restaurant on Chapel Street. I chose mine from the daily specials the waitress read.
I can’t remember exactly what it was I ordered, though it did have chicken sausage over penne pasta. I do remember, there was so much ‘range fed’ this and ‘organic’ that in her description, I felt ordering it would also commit me to vote for Ralph Nader (if he ever runs again)!
Lunch, and luncheon company, were very good.
I walked back to the station. On the way, a few people stopped me to say hello and kid me about the weather. If there was ever a good day to be the weatherman, today was that day.
Through the afternoon I thought about how I’d avoid dinner. Lunch was plenty. Then, my friend Harvey came on Instant Messenger.
Harvey is a physician – a specialist in pregnancy¹. Every time I introduce him to someone, I say Harvey gets women pregnant for a living. It’s a cute line and Harvey has never asked me to stop saying it.
We headed out for dinner at the diner – salads.
We both talked about our girls – he has three to my one.
It’s so strange to me to be having these grown up conversations with other grownups. But, I suppose I am one and there’s little I can do to change that.
Actually, at lunch, Josh and I had a similar adult-ish conversation. Growing up is sneaky. I don’t feel old, but when I look around I know I’m older than most of the people I see. And, my life revolves around adult responsibilities.
I just don’t remember exactly when I grew up.
¹ – Harvey’s medical specialties also includes women’s orgasms. There is no joke here. That’s a heck of a thing to be known for.
Quoted In The Norwich Bulletin
I think I’ve become the low hanging fruit of weather quotes. I was included in an article published today in the Norwich Bulletin.
Use the link above if you want to read it, though I’m attaching it to the jump should that link go stale.
Why Wilma Scares Me
Just in case you’re counting, Hurricane Wilma is currently 1735 miles southwest of me. That’s ‘as the crow flies’ miles. Because this hurricane is ready to make a sweeping right hand turn, it would have to travel significantly farther.
How can I be worried about something 1735 miles away? It’s easy – I’ve seen this scenario before. I didn’t live it. It predates me. I’ve studied it because it is the benchmark for New England hurricane grief.
Before you feel my pain, let me talk a little about my parents. They’re ensconced in Boynton Beach, FL. Hurricane Wilma is 640 miles south-southwest of them.
As it stands now, the official Hurricane Center prediction takes Wilma right over… or reasonably close to them. Though the storm will be coming over land, it’s swampy land. There’s warm water and low friction in the Everglades. It’s not perfect for a hurricane but it won’t kill it either.
My folks have hurricane shutters and live in a substantial building. I think they’ll be OK, though I’ll revisit this with them later today.
Here’s the one bit of good news. Hurricane Wilma will be ‘booking’ as she passes through Florida. Coast-to-coast will be 10, maybe 12 hours. The faster Hurricane Wilma moves, the sooner the trouble is over.
Nature adapts to this kind of trouble. Palm trees have decidedly less wind resistance than the deciduous trees we have here in Connecticut.
The Hurricane Center forecasts 110 mph winds at landfall in Florida, dropping to 80 mph by the time the storm reemerges in the Atlantic¹. Even 80 mph, a small hurricane, is substantial if it passes close by. Most of us have never experienced 80 mph winds… and we’ve all seen plenty of wind damage.
The Hurricane Center used to talk about 80 mph storms as minimal hurricanes. They don’t anymore. That’s a change for the better.
I am anticipating moderate to severe damage on the West Coast of Florida with minimal to scattered moderate damage on the East Coast. There will be a much smaller radius of damage in the east.
Once the storm leaves Florida the guessing game begins. It will really accelerate. This is the part that starts resembling the Hurricane of ’38.
Though the storm struck Connecticut’s coast in Fairfield County, the strongest damage was experienced at the opposite end of the state and into Rhode Island.
Here’s what’s most troubling. A storm barreling up the East Coast will leave minimal time for warning. Look at the map. Florida to New Jersey in 24 hours! I couldn’t drive it that quickly.
To get a Hurricane Warning out 24 hours in advance would mean alerting most of the Northeast. An error of a few degrees in course could mean Atlantic City versus Boston.
And where would all these people go? Imagine sending everyone in Coastal New England west on I-95!
This is the worst case scenario. A direct hit to New England would cause as much destruction, and possibly as many deaths, as the unpredicted storm in 1938!
The current projections bring Hurricane Wilma far enough east to spare New England. But there is very little margin for error over a five day forecast. I’m certainly not confident in it. Just a few degrees off…
So now we wait and watch. Like I said, there will be lots of phone calls to Florida tomorrow. I want to make sure my parents have every possible advantage. Then we’ll bring the worries closer to home.
Hurricane Wilma scares me to the bone.
¹ – The Hurricane Center readily admits, of all the things it does, predicting intensity is the thing it does worst.
Hurricane Wilma – The Hurricane Center Catches On
Earlier, I wrote about the radical track shift on some of today’s computer guidance on Hurricane Wilma. It looks like the Hurricane Center has caught on to that.
PRESSURE SYSTEM IN THE GREAT LAKES REGION. ALL THREE OF THESE MODELS HAVE BACKED OFF OF THIS SOLUTION…WITH THE GFDL SHOWING AN EXTREME CHANGE…WITH ITS 5-DAY POSITION SHIFTING A MERE 1650 NMI FROM ITS PREVIOUS POSITION IN MAINE TO THE WESTERN TIP OF CUBA.
THERE IS ALMOST AS MUCH SPREAD IN THE 5-DAY POSITIONS OF THE 12Z GFS ENSEMBLE MEMBERS…WHICH RANGE FROM THE YUCATAN TO WELL EAST OF THE DELMARVA PENINSULA. WHAT THIS ILLUSTRATES IS THE EXTREME SENSITIVITY OF WILMA’S FUTURE TRACK TO ITS INTERACTION WITH THE GREAT LAKES LOW. OVER THE PAST COUPLE OF DAYS…WILMA HAS BEEN MOVING SLIGHTLY TO THE LEFT OR SOUTH OF THE MODEL GUIDANCE…AND THE LEFT-MOST OF THE GUIDANCE SOLUTIONS ARE NOW SHOWING WILMA DELAYING OR MISSING THE CONNECTION WITH THE LOW. I HAVE SLOWED THE OFFICIAL FORECAST JUST A LITTLE BIT AT THIS TIME…BUT IF WILMA CONTINUES TO MOVE MORE TO THE LEFT THAN EXPECTED…SUBSTANTIAL CHANGES TO THE OFFICIAL FORECAST MAY HAVE TO BE MADE DOWN THE LINE. NEEDLESS TO SAY…CONFIDENCE IN THE FORECAST TRACK…ESPECIALLY THE TIMING…HAS DECREASED CONSIDERABLY.
Remind me not to switch jobs with the forecasters at the Hurricane Center. This is tough stuff with a lot on the line.
Their typical response to radical forecast shifts is to wait and make sure it’s not one piece of unexpected bad data that’s thrown things off. If the models continue this trend of turning, tonight’s 11 PM EDT update will move the forecast in a big way… and people in Florida will exhale.
Hurricane Wilma On My Mind
I so wanted to make a joke about Wilma and Fred Flintstone. The window of opportunity to look at this as a funny little storm came and went in an instant. Wilma has me worried.
At the moment, the best view is from satellite, though I suspect the Mexican radar at Cancun will start seeing the structure of the storm later today.
This is not a good scenario for my folks who live in Southern Palm Beach County, Florida. In fact, it’s just not good for anyone in South Florida – and I believe they know it.
For many in Florida the first hurricane was an adventure. That romantic outlook is long gone. Hurricanes are terrifying and you don’t need a direct hit to bring grief, trouble, inconvenience and cost.
I’ll bet my folks put the hurricane shutters down a little quicker this time.
I was up, chatting with my friend Bob last night when the first signs of major trouble came in. Bob has his PhD in meteo, so it’s no stretch to say he’s much geekier and meteorologically adept than I am. He was reading the raw recon data from the Hurricane Hunter plane. I seldom do that when a storm is so far from land.
He tipped me of to the report of the 3 nautical mile eye¹. We were both amazed. Then he caught the pressure fall. That was even more stunning.
This is my analogy, so Bob can distance himself if it’s not 100% on the mark: The pressure had dropped so much that being at a point the eye passed (impossible in real life, but stay with me here) would have been the equivalent of sitting on the wing of a twin engine prop plane as it took of and climbed to about 5,000 feet. The wind you’d feel and pressure drop you’d experience were pretty similar.
First the good news. Wilma will not stay at 175 mph. I’ve gone over this before, but it bears repeating. There is a ‘sweet spot’ for hurricanes where they can achieve symmetry and near physical perfection. As soon as one little parameter goes out of balance, that symmetry breaks down and the storm loses strength.
That being said, going from 175 mph to, let’s say 130 mph, isn’t much comfort.
Oh – did I mention Wilma could head for New England? My gut tells me it’s wide and to the right, but too close to dismiss at the moment.
If… again, that’s if… it does come north and does affect New England, the storm’s structure and forward speed (along with hurricane wind speed) will need to be closely watched. The Great New England Hurricane of ’38 hit Fairfield County, Connecticut, but its greatest hurricane force winds were felt 100 miles or more east of the center!
I’ll be writing more about Wilma later today. In the meantime, the hurricane links on the right side of this page are ‘live’ and will get you to the latest hurricane info, no matter when you read this.
¹ – It might have gotten smaller today. I saw a reference to a 2 nautical mile eye on Dr. Jeff Masters blog.
Dinner With My Wife
Since Steffie has gone to school, and since we’ve added live early evening news briefs, I haven’t gotten home much for dinner. I suspect… no, I know, Helaine relishes this time to herself.
Sometimes I’ll call and ask if she wants to join me for dinner, but she’s already fed at 4:30. We are on different ends of the clock.
Earlier today we made a date and she met me for dinner at the Greek Olive.
It was pouring when she arrived and workers had blocked the station’s driveway as they unloaded new office furniture. She sat in the car until I was done and then we were on our way.
The dinner itself doesn’t have to be special (I broken every diet law I know and had New England clam chowder to boot) as long as the company is.
It was good to see her with both of us wide awake and neither of us rushing off.
Nearly twenty two years of marriage and she’s still great company… there’s still lots to share.
I’m More Pessimistic About Hurricanes
Recently I was interviewed for an article in Business New Haven concerning hurricanes. I’ve linked to the text.
Over time I’ve become more pessimistic of what might happen in a repeat of the hurricane of ’38 scenario for Connecticut. There would be little time for warning and difficulty explaining where the damage might occur.
Even in 2005, a tragedy seems unavoidable. That’s not what I want to say, but it is a realistic expectation.
I’m glad to see, though Dr. Mel Goldstein and I were interviewed separately (I didn’t even know he had been interviewed), we are in agreement with our concern.
Unlike Katrina where good advice was ignored, I’m not sure what we could do today to help prepare us for a hurricane approaching us at 60 mph. The entire East Coast would need warning. What good would that do?
The Cracker Barrel Experience
Helaine was away this past weekend, at concerts in Illinois and Indiana. She and her friend Renata put a few hundred miles on a rental car out of Chicago.
As they drove through the countryside (certainly beyond the edge of civilization) they looked for a spot to eat. Somehow, early in the trip, they ended up at Cracker Barrel.
For the uninitiated (and until an hour ago, that included me) Cracker Barrel is a chain of absolutely identical kitschy restaurants with a country flavor. In the Disneyworld tradition, the only way in or out is through a gift shop!
Helaine ate her first meal and immediately picked up the cellphone. The food was so good… and unhealthy. It was fried and gravied and breaded beyond belief. It was yummy.
On her quick weekend trip she paid three visits to Cracker Barrel! Thank heavens she took a cholesterol test the week before she went.
As you might imagine, Helaine was anxious to get me to share the experience (and, selfishly, return for dinner herself). Tonight was our night, because as it turns out, there’s a Cracker Barrel in Milford just off the Turnpike.
Somehow we had gone through 21 years in Connecticut without seeing more than this restaurant’s sign, sitting high above the Interstate. We had directions, but even then it was a little anti-intuitive. You really had to know where you were going.
We turned into the parking lot, driving past the sign showing buses and RVs where to park. As we walked in, Patsy Cline’s “Walking After Midnight” was playing on the ceiling mounted speakers. A group from “Christian Tours” was lining up to pay and leave.
We were escorted to the back room. In the Midwest, this room was a smoking section. Not so in polite New England, where smoking is prohibited pretty much everywhere… certainly everywhere food is served.
Helaine ordered the “Chicken Fried Chicken” and I had an egg and meat platter. I know it’s sacreligous there, but I am still watching my weight.
While waiting, we played a little game, left on the table, with a rectangular piece of wood and plastic golf tees stuffed in holes. The object of the game was to do better than either of us did!
The food came quickly and was pretty good. My eggs arrived with whole wheat toast which allegedly has only 7 net grams of carbohydrates. Helaine’s chicken came with some sort of gooey, sugary, baked apple concoction and gravy thick enough to caulk a bathtub.
Overhead classic country played continuously.
We finished, got up and began to leave. As we did, the table to our side all let out, “Hi Geoff.” Ratted out again!
Dinner for the two of us was around $20 including the rectangular golf tee game Helaine bought to take home.
I suppose if I made the suggestion, Helaine would go back tomorrow night too.
Which Storm Is Next?
Tropical Storm Lee came and went in an instant. There’s a Tropical Depression in the Atlantic that will probably be Maria. It’s in a place that doesn’t favor a North American threat.
Next would be Nate.
There is a chunk of moisture with thunderstorms popping up in the Eastern Atlantic. It is very far away. The Hurricane Center has not seen fit to give it a name or track it in any but the most basic way. It’s a possibility for Nate.
Earlier tonight, my friend Bob, the hurricane expert (PhD and teaching position in meteorology at a fine large university), said this blob of cloudiness deserved watching… and so I have joined its observers.
These small clusters of thunderstorms pop up off the west coast of Africa all the time during this part of the hurricane season. Hurricane birth is very much a movable feast. There are different climatologically favored areas, depending on the time of year.
Most of them collapse under their own weight. Only a few grow.
Even when they grow, there’s a good chance they’ll be like Lee – far away from people and not very long lived. There are many more Lees than there are Katrinas.
Hurricanes are difficult to predict. A lot of that has to do with the very light steering winds they encounter. A mile or two per hour or the change of a few degrees in wind direction make a big difference in where a hurricane will move over an extended length of time.
Then there’s the water temperature. Have we accurately observed what it is… or have we been fooled (because satellites, radar and our other tools aren’t quite as good as the general public thinks they are when a system’s very far from ground based instruments)?
Hurricanes are also compact systems. They’re too small to be easily or accurately picked up by the conventional computer models we use. And, we need dates far in the future for something closer to Africa than America. Our errors are multiplied with time.
After all that, knowing we’ll mostly be wrong, we look anyway. We often chatter among ourselves over these left field predictons. I’m not entirely sure why.
I’m attaching part of a computer model which picks up this pre-Nate cluster, allows the storm to engorge itself on warm, tropical, Atlantic water until it reaches hurricane strength, and then curves it up the East Coast.
I don’t believe it is true. I don’t think this forecast will happen. But, it’s all we have right now. It’s what the geeky boys are currently talking about
Will there be a Nate and will he be right off the New England coast Tuesday, September 13, 2005 at 8:00 PM EDT (9/14/2005 0000Z) as this maps shows? Stay tuned.
Stranger things have happened.
On To The Weekend
First things first. My tooth pain has greatly subsided. There’s still swelling on the gum, but I’m hoping that’s from the injections. The tooth is in my drawer, where it now belongs.
Let me add, though I took a sick day from work Thursday, Friday was already scheduled as a vacation day. Bad timing on my part.
We once had an employee at the station who tried to explain to my boss that since she was sick on her vacation day, it should count as a sick day. That’s chutzpah.
I was well enough to head to the shoreline for a planned family celebration. I’ve been told to keep my mouth shut on what was being celebrated, but we went to Lenny’s in Branford.
I was petrified to go! I’d run into Lenny’s daughter while having my hair cut and she told me how the place had been remodeled. Didn’t she understand? The charm of Lenny’s was that it looked like it was built out of whatever was stored in someone’s garage.
I’m glad to say the main dining room has been remodeled… the particle board removed from the walls… but it’s lost none of its charm. That’s a tall order. It looks nice – really, not just compared to its older self.
We weren’t going to Lenny’s for the ambiance. We were going for fried shrimp for the girls and the shore dinner for me.
Even with only one half of my mouth operating, it was great! The lobster, the mussels, the corn – excellent. Why you only get two clams is beyond me, but that ‘s what the dinner calls for. My only ‘customization’ was getting a bowl of Rhode Island clam chowder¹ instead of a cup.
Through dinner and the rest of the evening I was a little woozy. It wasn’t enough to stop me, but I certainly was in no condition to operate heavy equipment. Helaine drove and I was grateful to be her passenger.
When we got home, I napped. I couldn’t sleep all night because there was a test to be taken for my Oceanography class.
I took the test around 3:00 AM. This should be an interesting grade because I wasn’t really able to concentrate on reading the text necessary to answer the questions. I had the attention span of a toy poodle.
Back to bed at 4:00.
By the time I woke up this morning, I had gotten over 16 hours of sleep in the last 24. On the other hand, I was feeling better, which was good because I had long standing plans for a friend to visit.
I’ve known Bob since my first professional day in radio, early fall 1969. Bob was a disk jockey at WSAR in Fall River, MA, where I started.
When I first me him he was Skippy Ross, then Skip Tyler, now (for over thirty years) Bob Lacey. With his partner Sheri Lynch, Bob presides over a very successful, syndicated morning radio show. It’s a show considered ‘woman friendly.’
Bob had left Charlotte, NC Thursday afternoon and had been hanging around New England since Thursday evening. Though I’d tried getting him on his cell phone a few times, he was unreachable.
By early this morning there was a discussion whether Bob was actually going to show or not. It was starting to look like ‘not’ had won when the phone rang.
He showed up an hour later and we hopped in the convertible on what had turned into a spectacular spring day. The sky was blue, temperature warm, humidity about right. We were heading toward the shoreline.
Bob had actually grown up around New Haven and knows those parts of the area that haven’t changed over the last 40 years – which is most of it!
First stop was lunch. We went to a place call “The Place” in Guilford. “The Place” is one of a kind.
You sit outside (in the open or under a tent-like cover) on old tree stumps. The food (lobster, clams, chicken and the like) are cooked out of door on a long wood fired grill. When your order is ready, the grill it cooked on is brought to your table.
The owner, Vaughn, kvetched about the weather. I would think to a place like this good weather means good business and a May like we had means… well, it wasn’t a good sign.
Bob had a lobster and I had clams. I’m sorry to be positive about everything, but it was great.
Next up we drove down the Turnpike into Old Lyme and then headed randomly into an area called “Miami Beach.” We drove down Hartford Avenue and I was astounded – 21 years in Connecticut and I’d never been to this cool, vest pocket, beach community.
A friendly cop showed us where we could park and we were off. This is a really nice beach. As Connecticut’s Long Island Sound beaches go, it is broad and white. There are plenty of stones which makes barefoot walking a little tougher.
Of course Bob and I were dressed totally wrong for a day at the beach – both wearing long pants.
We moved off the beach itself and into an open air beachfront bar. Bob had a beer and I a Diet Coke ($5+$2 tip). Reggae music was wafting in and it was perfect on this idyllic day.
Like “The Place,” I have to wonder how open air establishments like this make it in the ratified air of a short season Connecticut summer, and with total dependence on good weather. Every season has got to be make or break. I thought about that as I sipped my Coke.
We didn’t have long. Bob had dinner plans with some friends he’s known longer than me. We continued east to Mohegan Sun, the closer of the two Connecticut mega casinos.
Bob was stunned. It is a very impressive place. And, the shopping area with its upscale shops connecting the old and new casinos is elegantly glitzy.
Bob wanted to play craps, though he hadn’t played in years. I pulled $60 out of my pocket and quickly turned it into $15 – good going. Bob had similar luck, but on a lesser scale.
We headed for the car and headed back home.
Bob will be back in Connecticut in the middle of August. We’re hoping to see the Red Sox and visit WSAR’s studio. Truth is, hanging with a friend is the important part. The rest is just icing on the cake.
¹ – I had never heard of Rhode Island clam chowder until I moved to Connecticut. Manhattan is red, New England is creamy and Rhode Island is a clear broth. When properly spiced, it’s great and nowhere as heavy as New England. As for Manhattan clam chowder – please! Who’s eating that?
The Cutoff Low
Let me bring you into “Weatherworld” for a moment. Here in New England, we’re having a stretch of cool and damp days as a low pressure system waffles around the area.
The meteorological term for what’s controlling our weather is a “cutoff low.” That means the low pressure system is cutoff from the force of the jet stream – there’s nothing to push it on its way.
Short term forecasting is fairly simple. It will stay lousy.
Longer range forecasting is much more difficult. These cutoff lows stay stable until something unclogs the pattern. Unfortunately, that’s often impossible to predict until the moment it happens.
I’m forced to forecast a continuation of what’s going on, knowing that might not necessarily be the case. It’s the best forecast, but it’s not my most confident of forecasts.
With Memorial Day weekend a few days away, I’m hoping something happens sooner rather than later.
The Trip Continues
Getting to Philadelphia was no problem. It was leaving that seemed to be the sticking point.
I had a long layover in Philadelphia – over an hour and a half. The Embraer Regional Jet to Atlanta was in on time. We boarded on time. And then the announcement.
The pilot came on from the cockpit to tell us thunderstorms around Atlanta were going hold us up. It would be an hour until he found out when we’d be!” And, since the gate was needed for another plane, he’d drive to a quiet spot for us to wait.
I’d like to tell you the passengers protested, or the wait was interminable or some other tragic story of passenger pain, but it wasn’t that bad. We left Philadelphia about an hour and a half late.
I actually found the plane, an ERJ170, reasonably comfortable. Just like the Dash-8 I took from New Haven to Philadelphia, this plane had plenty of legroom in narrow seats. The interior was spartan and somehow European. The interior actually reminded me of a Fokker-100.¹
Is it just me or is it weird to be on an airplane designed and built in Brazil?
The trip to Atlanta was bumpy, but uneventful. Getting off in Atlanta was another story. The terminal looked like a mall on the weekend before Christmas. It was jammed – as busy as any airline terminal I had ever visited.
Helaine had found a great deal for a medium size car from Avis. That ended up being a Chevy Malibu. It is possible there is a car that has less style, but I doubt it. It looks like it was designed and built with absolutely no anticipation anyone would actually want to own one. They were right.
My hotel is the Hilton Garden Inn – Perimeter in one of the many exurbs that ring Atlanta. This is actually a fairly nice hotel and a good value. And, along with everything else, there’s free high speed Internet service (though not enough signal at the desk in this room to use it from there).
This evening (a late evening) I joined Mark and Annie, both of whom I worked with at Channel 8, for dinner. I left it up to them and we went to Ted’s… owned by Ted Turner and featuring Bison meat!
We all had Bison burgers, which were very good. I also had New England clam chowder (could have been warmer and larger, but it was very tasty). This being Atlanta, Coca Cola’s world headquarters, I broke down and had a Coke, which was served from the glass bottle.
Next stop was CNN, where Mark and Annie now work. This is interesting because there are familiar views in the CNN Center that I’ve seen for years.
Visiting CNN at night, there were no on-air types to be seen. Most of their nighttime programming is from New York or Los Angeles (Larry King).
Actually, that gave me more of an opportunity to look around. Their newsroom, directly behind the news set, may be the most photogenic TV space I’ve ever been in.
Busy day. I’m going to bed.
¹ – The Fokker 100 is a small, though older, regional jet. USAir used to fly them to Buffalo. They were quite comfortable, except for the low ceilings. They were low enough that I once asked a flight attendant if her assignment in this particular model was penance for something she had done?
I’m Not Currently Speaking With Mother Nature
It didn’t snow today. Oh, it will later – but that’s too little too late.
Yesterday, in the face of reality wildly deviating from my previous forecast, I was forced to change snow to rain. Sure they’re both storms, but this is like going from the Enquirer to the Times.
On the air I stepped up and admitted the radical shift. I’m not sure I’ve ever hidden from that kind of mea culpa, but I can understand why some forecasters do it. I think viewers are more likely to forgive if I take responsibility… just as long as I don’t do it too often.
In the past, I’ve read technical forecast discussions where consistency is talked about… as in leaving a wrong forecast up for one more cycle because the new data isn’t consistent with the old data. That I don’t understand.
In thinking about what transpired, as I write this entry, I realize my own expectations for accuracy have changed. This forecast change was made long before the onset of the precipitation. It was Wednesday and the snowiest and stormiest weather was never expected before Thursday. Five or ten years ago, that correction would have been a coup.
I can’t quantify it exactly, but I think what I used to expect in 1-day accuracy is now what I expect two days out.
Where have I gone wrong? I kid around when I make speeches to organizations. “We know the laws of physics. They are inviolate. So I’ll never make a mistake.” Cue the laughter.
What upsets me is how far off the temperatures were above the ground, especially in the two to thousand foot level. That was really what changed this from a snow to rain event. The rain snow line was way north – into central New England, not along the Connecticut shoreline.
Yesterday, a few friends and co-workers consoled me. “Everyone” had gotten it wrong – not just me. As far as that goes, it was nice of them to say. It is, however, no consolation at all. I want to be (and I’m sure I’m not alone) better than the others, with more insight into the future. Getting it right or wrong is an individual thing, not a group effort.
Anyway, the good thing about forecasting is, I get to go back and try again today.
At some point I will look back, or read some scholarly retrospective on this or a similar storm, and have a “Eureka¹” moment where it will all make sense. Right now, it does not.
¹ – I have used the phrase “Eureka moment” before, and realize not everyone knows where it comes from or why it’s fitting. “Eureka” was the word supposedly exclaimed by Archimedes when he discovered how to measure the volume of an irregular solid and, in doing so, determine the purity of a gold object. It was a scientific breakthrough that opened the door for more in the future.