WDRB Weather Blog

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Posted by Kappell at 6:47 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0)

09/11/2017

Irma set to deliver good rains and some wind to the area.

After a week of creating havoc across the Caribbean and the Southeastern US, Irma will be arriving here locally over the next couple of days fortunately in a much weaker state.

Let's time it out with AdvanceTrak...

AT shows the wind picking up out of the northeast this evening on the order of 10 to 20 mph with gusts to 25 or so.

Rain moves into Southeastern Kentucky by late evening and reaches the Ohio River before dawn on Tuesday as Irma slowly crosses through dixie.

Following a morning round of rain, we'll likely see a break during the middle of the day on Tuesday with breezy conditions continuing. Wind gusts could reach 30 mph or so on Tuesday before diminishing late.

A second round of showers is a good possibility into the late afternoon/evening hours with a few rumbles of thunder possible. Severe weather is not anticipated.

The tropical cyclone continues to unwind Tuesday night with additional showers expected for much of the region.

Irma looses all tropical characteristics by Wednesday as it slowly moves across the region.

This will translate to solid cloud cover, more showers and very cool temps for this time of the year.

Showers look to exit the region on Thursday with sun returning on Friday with much warmer conditions over the weekend.

How much rain?

Most models agree that this won't be a particularly heavy rain event in our area. However, anywhere between a half inch and two inches of rain may be possible with the axis of heaviest precip falling over our Eastern/Southeastern Counties over a three day period ending on Thursday. So this will be a good beneficial soaking, but not enough to cause any problems.

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

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Posted by Kappell at 6:16 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0)

09/10/2017

Drone Footage Showing Aftermath Following IRMA's Landfall in Naples!

Drone footage showing Hurricane Irma's aftermath following landfall in Naples, Florida, on Sunday.

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

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Posted by Kappell at 11:11 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0)

09/06/2017

A MAJOR X-CLASS SOLAR FLARE ERUPTS FROM OUR SUN!!!

YouTube Video via Solar Ham

The largest solar flare of the current solar cycle 24 was just observed around region 2673. The massive event measuring X9.3 peaked at 12:02 UTC Wednesday. A Type II radio emission with an estimated velocity of 1969 km/s was recorded.

A bright, fast moving halo coronal mass ejection (CME) was observed leaving the sun following the event and does indeed have an Earth directed component. Because of the sunspots location now off center in the southwest quadrant, the bulk of the plasma cloud is traveling to the west. The Earth directed flank is still significant enough to almost make a geomagnetic storm a certainty by Friday. Sky watchers should be alert for visible aurora during the next several nights while we await another CME generated an M5.5 flare on Sept. 4. Stay tuned to SolarHam.com for the most up to date information.

X-rays and strong UV radiation from the blast caused a radio back out over much Europe, Africa and Eastern South America.

The solar flare is the strongest of a series emitting from a rather large sunspot rotating across the western limb of our sun. AR2673 is expected to remain a hot bed of solar activity in the coming days. In the meantime, sky gazers remain on "aurora alert" status!

Keep your fingers crossed for that.

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

Email me at [email protected]

Posted by Kappell at 5:24 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (3)

09/03/2017

Irma strengthening in the open Atlantic. Could threaten US next weekend...

There is a monster looming in the Atlantic and it's name is Irma.

Here's the latest from the National Hurricane Center...

...MAJOR HURRICANE IRMA EXPECTED TO BE NEAR THE NORTHERN LEEWARD
ISLANDS TUESDAY NIGHT...

SUMMARY OF 1100 PM AST...0300 UTC...INFORMATION
-----------------------------------------------
LOCATION...17.2N 51.0W
ABOUT 710 MI...1145 KM E OF THE LEEWARD ISLANDS
MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS...115 MPH...185 KM/H
PRESENT MOVEMENT...WSW OR 255 DEGREES AT 14 MPH...22 KM/H
MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE...961 MB...28.38 INCHES

The latest forecast track by NHC takes the Category 3 storm and strengthens it to Cat-4 status over the next day or so as it tracks towards the Northern Leeward Islands on Tuesday. Some of the data supports the idea the storm could actually be stronger possibly reaching Category 5 status by midweek! From there it is forecast to continue a general westward motion approaching the Bahamas Thursday and Friday.

While the potential impacts to US soil is still at least 6 days away, there is very good agreement among the varies weather/tropical models showing the storm possibly approaching the Florida East Coast or the Florida Straights by next weekend.

This puts a large swath of the Southeastern US in play including the Gulf of Mexico.

Fingers crossed that this course changes. We'll be watching.

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

Email me at [email protected]

Posted by Kappell at 11:00 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (1)

09/02/2017

NASA: Harvey Churned Up and Cooled Down the Gulf

Hurricane Harvey changed the landscape of southern Texas and the lives of millions of people. The storm also changed the surface profile of the Gulf of Mexico, though those effects are likely to be short-lived.

When Harvey crossed the Yucatán Peninsula into the Gulf of Mexico on August 22–23, 2017, the tropical depression moved into waters that were 1.5 to 4 degrees Celsius (2.5 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the long-term regional average for sea surface temperatures. Hurricanes feed off of warm ocean temperatures, like a fire relies on a steady oxygen supply to keep burning. “So this deep, warm pool of water helped provide additional fuel for Harvey to intensify,” said Dalia Kirschbaum, a scientist and natural hazards specialist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

Once in the Gulf, Harvey grew rapidly and sped toward the Texas coast as a category 4 hurricane—then lingered for five days as a potent tropical storm. In the process, the storm dropped unprecedented amounts of rainwater on Houston and southern Texas while churning up the Gulf of Mexico.

The maps at the top of this page show sea surface temperatures in the western Gulf of Mexico on August 23 and August 30, 2017, as well as the storm track for Harvey. The second pair of maps shows sea surface temperature anomalies; that is, how much the surface layer was above or below the long-term average temperature for this time of year. The data for all of the maps were compiled by Coral Reef Watch, which blends observations from the Suomi NPP, MTSAT, Meteosat, and GOES satellites with computer models.

All of the fresh rainwater and the ocean mixing from the storm combined to dramatically alter the surface waters of the Gulf. Cooling naturally as it rose through the atmosphere, the water that fell back onto the sea as rain likely would have been cooler than the surface waters. At the same time, the winds and waves of the storm worked to disperse warm surface water and to bring up cooler water from the ocean depths.

In theory, the cooler water now near the surface of the northern Gulf of Mexico should make it less likely for a new storm to develop or intensify there in the coming weeks. However, the waters of the Gulf are not exactly cool. Scientists generally agree that sea surface temperatures (SSTs) should be above 27.8°C (82°F) to promote the development and intensification of hurricanes. (There are some exceptions.) So even some of the light blues on our sea surface temperature maps are still warm enough for storms.

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

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Posted by Kappell at 11:19 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0)

08/29/2017

Harvey is picking up steam and heading this way...

Former category 4 Hurricane Harvey continues to menace the Gulf Coast with more heavy rain and wind.

At last check the tropical storm was located about 80 miles SSW of Port Arthor Texas with sustained winds of 45 mph and central pressure of 997 mb.

Movement is towards the Norh-North East and fortunately is expected to pick up speed over the next couple of days with the National Hurricane Center forecasting the storm to track into the Tennessee and Ohio River Valleys by the end of the week and into the weekend.

If anything, current model data suggests the low may travel a little faster and a little further north than the current forecast track.

Let's time it out with the current run of the GFS...

The GFS shows Havey making a second landfall on the TX/LA border tonight and into the early morning hours on Wednesday.

From there, the storm lifts north through the Lower Mississippi River Valley as it slowly weakens perhaps pushing rain into our area by late on Thursday.

A large band of rain consolidates ahead of the low and enters our area by early on Friday.

The rain continues for most of the day on Friday and could be quite heavy at times.

The actual low itself is projected by the GFS to move right across our area Saturday morning before lifting late in the day.

While this would mean a wet start to the weekend, it could also mean improving conditions for the second half with rain chances going down late Saturday and into Sunday.

So how much are we talking about locally?

If current data holds true, then rainfall locally could be excessive. While nothing like what they are dealing with in SE Texas and Louisiana, it will could be a real soaker for our area too with much of the data showing between 2 and 4 inches possible across our area. Although the rain would be beneficial, it could also lead to some minor flooding issues here.

The heaviest of the rain looks to occur Friday and into Friday night. In addition to the heavy rain, winds will be elevated with gusts to 30 or 40 mph possible.

Marc and Rick will have a full update on what to expect on WDRB News this evening.

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

Email me at [email protected]

Posted by Kappell at 2:32 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0)

08/27/2017

Catastrophic Flooding Continues in Texas

Historic flooding continues over the Houston area and much of Southeastern Texas with more torrential rainfall expected in the days ahead.

A state of emergency has be issued for parts of the Lone Star State with staggering rainfall totals approaching two feet since the former Category 4 Hurricane came on shore Friday evening just east of Corpus Christi.

As this storm continues to slowly unwind, unfortunately, it's not expected to move much bringing a continue feed of moisture to the east side of the circulation right off the Gulf of Mexico as much of the Southern Plains and Lower Mississippi River Valley gets inundated with record rainfall amounts.

In some cases, an addition 20 or even 25 inches will be possible between now and the end of next week with more catastrophic flooding expected.

Prayers to the impacted by this devastating storm.

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

Email me at [email protected]

Posted by Kappell at 11:00 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0)

08/26/2017

VIDEO: NASA Chasing the Shadow at 50,000 Feet!

Video via Curious Droid Published on Aug 11, 2017

For some, the Great American Eclipse will be almost 3x longer than for those in the best spot on the ground.
For those lucky few will be in a pair of NASA WB-57's at 50,000 ft chasing the solar eclipse but it's not the first time this has been done.
In 1973 Concorde 001 chased the longest solar eclipse for 1000 years over Africa for over 70 minutes, a record that remains unbroken.

Sponsors : Symon Hamer, Florian Hesse, Marcus Chiado, Mitchell Payce, Skalgrin, JÃ¸rn Karlsen, John Roscoe.

Patreon : https://www.patreon.com/curiousdroid

Presented by Paul Shillito
Written & Researched by Andy Munzer
Additional Material by Paul Shillito
Images and footage: NASA, ESA, Aerospatiale, C.N.R.S Paris, Filmtec.
Music by Paul Shillito
https://soundcloud.com/paulshillito/n...

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell

Email me at [email protected]

Posted by Kappell at 11:50 PM in Science, Television, Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0)

08/23/2017

360 VIDEO: See the TOTAL Solar Eclipse in Virtual Reality!

In case you didn't see the TOTAL solar eclipse in person, this may be as close as you can get to the real experience...

Published on Aug 22, 2017

See the total Solar Eclipse from August 21, 2017 in 4K 360º VR filmed in Casper, Wyoming.
Subscribe to TIME ►► http://po.st/SubscribeTIME

On August 21, a total solar eclipse will take place over the continental U.S. If you're unable to see it in person, TIME has got you covered. Follow TIME on Youtube, Twitter, Instagram & Facebook to watch our live broadcast of the eclipse, hosted by TIME Editor at Large, Jeffrey Kluger, and spaceflight historian, Amy Shira Teitel.
Subscribe to Vintage Space with Amy Shira Teitel ►► http://po.st/SubscribeVintageSpace

Connect with Vintage Space
Twitter: https://twitter.com/astVintageSpace
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/amyshirateitel

Very cool!

WDRB Meteorologist Jeremy Kappell