Northern Hemisphere has a Longer Summer: Am I Naive or Did You Know

Posted by Mike Collins on Apr 7, 2011 in Random Thoughts | 1 comment

I love reading new bits of information and learning things I had no idea bout.  This morning I read on BBC that the Northern Hemisphere has a longer summer than the Southern.

Somehow I feel I should have known that. Did you know? The source is here at BBC ” Our orbit and missing days of winter”

Let me know and comment below.

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Winter Weather Snarls Travel, Could Strand Travelers For Days – WBUR

Posted by Mike Collins on Feb 10, 2011 in Travel News | 0 comments

BOSTON — A major winter storm brought blizzard conditions to much of the Northeast and continued to wreak havoc on travel plans throughout the Boston-area.

Gov. Deval Patrick declared a state of emergency Sunday and urged residents to avoid driving Monday.

“We’re going to have these conditions through about 10 or 11, or maybe midday, today,” Patrick said. “For the public’s own safety and to give the plows a chance, we’re asking people as much as possible to stay indoors and off the roads,” Patrick said.

Though Boston’s Logan Airport is open, many Northeast airports are closed, snarling air traffic up and down the East Coast.

Planes on the ground at Logan are being allowed to takeoff, according to airport spokesman Phil Orlandella.

“If a plane is here and they get themselves di-iced and boarded they can go,” Orlandella said. “There’s no problem, if they’re here.”

Though flights are able to take off, the Associated Press reported that the storm may affect passengers flying out of Logan for days to come, thanks to a backlog of stranded travelers.

After canceling service Sunday, Amtrak began limited service on Monday.

Amtrak passengers that have tickets for travel between Boston and New York on Monday may experience delays, but will be able to travel, according to spokesman Cliff Cole.

“We’re not going to run as many trains as we usually run, and the service will be Northeast Regional, not the Acela Express for the time being,” Cole said.

State officials are urging commuters to utilize public transportation as much as possible, in order to give plow crews as much time and space to clear the roads as possible.

The T is running, but the bus system faced delays due to the road conditions.

The MBTA ran special “snow trains” Sunday night in order to keep the tracks clear.

“They just run up and down each rail line on the subway and commuter rail side,” MBTA Spokesman Joe Pesaturo said. “Their job is to keep the tracks free and clear of snow and ice. They did a good job of that. We also kept the trains moving, in and out of the yards, at the ends of each line overnight.”

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Weather adds anxiety to travel – Omaha World-Herald

Posted by Mike Collins on Feb 7, 2011 in Travel News | 0 comments

Wintry weather will sweep across the U.S. in advance of Christmas, bringing snow to the Midlands along with snow, ice and rain further south.

Iowa is expected to be in the path of the heaviest snowfall, but travel conditions are expected to be worse further south, where a more powerful portion of the storm system is expected to track.

“They’re expecting ice and a big mess down south, so for people who are heading south, it’s not going to be pretty,” said Becky Kern, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Valley. Snow and rain also are expected to accompany the southern system, depending upon the location.

The Omaha metro area currently is forecast to receive 1 inch to 3 inches of snow from Thursday afternoon into Friday morning. Iowa was looking at 3 inches to 5 inches in a band from northwest to southeast.

But there is some good news, Kern said.

“Unlike last year’s Christmas fiasco, we’re not going to have the winds, so that’s good,” she said. Last Christmas, a blizzard brought heavy snow and 40 mph to 50 mph winds, keeping people housebound and sabotaging efforts to clear roads.

This year, Kern said, winds likely will be out of the east at 5 mph to 10 mph.

“That should allow the snow to fall and stay in place,” she said. “It should be kind of pretty. Of course, people who are traveling might not think it is.”

This year’s storm has been hard to forecast, meteorologists say, because it is hasn’t been as well-defined while over the Pacific Ocean. Now that the system has come ashore, they are getting a better sense of the storm’s intentions because there are more land-based weather sensors to provide data about its internal workings.

“Our (forecasting) confidence is getting a lot higher than in the last few days,” Kern said Wednesday morning.

However, the system continues to evolve.

Barbara Mayes, also a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Valley, encouraged people to pay attention to changing conditions and remain flexible with travel plans.

“Be prepared and have an alternate plan,” Mayes said. “If you do travel, be sure to take a winter weather kit and take all the necessary precautions.”

The storm system will move across the western United States in two pieces, which then are expected to merge somewhere in the middle to eastern half of the country.

The piece most likely to affect the Midlands is coming out of southwestern Canada and traveling southeast across the U.S. It is expected to track across the Dakotas, through Iowa and into the Ohio River Valley.

The southern piece, which is much more powerful, is forecast to track across southern Plains.

Once the storms join, they are expected to strengthen considerably.

One concern for the Midlands is that the northern storm might pull the same trick played by two other systems earlier this month: pulling itself together directly over Nebraska, leading to a sudden explosion of bad weather. That’s what happened with the wintry-mix ice storm that struck in the middle of last week and with the blizzard that hit Dec. 11.

Based on current projections, the heaviest snow should reach the Omaha area after 6 p.m. Thursday and end about 12 hours later, Kern said. There remains a chance, however, that it could start late Thursday morning and linger into Friday afternoon, she said.

Colder weather will follow in the wake of the storm. Daytime highs in the metro area, which are likely to be in the 20s through Saturday, may not climb out of the teens on Sunday. Overnight Saturday, the low could dip to near zero.

Travelers who will be on the road at the end of Christmas weekend could find much better conditions. Even though it will be cold, sunny to partly sunny skies are forecast for much of the central U.S. on Sunday.

Contact the writer:

444-1102, nancy.gaarder@owh.com

Copyright ©2010 Omaha World-Herald®. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, displayed or redistributed for any purpose without permission from the Omaha World-Herald.

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