Friday, January 30, 2009

"Mr. Tornado" -- Theodore Fujita

Since it has been just over ten years since Dr. Fujita's death, I wrote a quick summary of his life and just a few of his accomplishments. Even though, truth be told, I have not done him justice.

Although he died in 1998, Dr. Tetsuya Theodore Fujita continues to be one of the most instrumental meteorology figures. He advanced the science of atmospheric science and severe thunderstorms like no other during his time. His legacy still continues today because of his endless devotion to studying and explaning severe weather phenomena. You may recognize the name Fujita; it is the common name for the tornado intensity scale--the Fujita Scale. Recently retired and replaced with the Enhanced Fujita Scale, the Fujita Scale was the first tornado rating scale based on damage severity alone. Mr. Tornado, as he was called, realized that there was a distinct corrolation between damage and tornadic wind speed.

Dr. Theodore Fujita was born in Japan on October 23, 1920 in the small rural town of Kitakyusu. After earning several degrees, including a Doctoral of Science from Tokyo University, Horace Byers encouraged him to come to the University of Chicago to futher his studies and teach meteorology.

Until the late 1970s when Dr. Fujita made extraordinary discoveries in the field of meteorology, tornadic thunderstorms were thought to have one main tornado that caused all of the damage associated with its path. The different wind damage patterns puzzled meteorologists and the general public. After observing and studying thousands of data and images, Dr. Fujita theorized that there were other "mini" tornadoes or vortices--more specifically called multiple vortex tornadoes-- that coexisted in particularly severe thunderstorms. In addition, he believed that thunderstorms had different types of wind shear within them--some surface based phenomenon included downbursts and tornadoes. He opined in several scientific journals that downbursts could be grouped into two distinct categories: either macrobursts or microbursts. The two prefixes simply indicate the magnitude of the damage from the air that falls. If the damage swath is less than 2.5 miles in diameter it is a microburst, if more it is a macroburst. All downbursts are caused by rapidly descending columns of air because of dry layers within a thunderstorm. These columns hit the surface of the Earth and spread rapidly outward. The damage caused by these collapses within cumulonimbus clouds had a distinct and obvious difference with the damage caused by tornadoes. These theories by Dr. Fujita were later proven by other scientists.

Dr. Fujita truly was an old-school scientist. Born in 1920, he was not educated in an age with supercomputers and computer modeling techniques. When the advent of computers did materialize, he believed that the computers simply "didn't understand these [meteorology] things" ("Tornado researcher Ted Fujita died in 1998," 2005).

During his childhood, he was in Japan amidst the growing tensions between the United States and Japan resulting in World War Two. Ironically, Fujita was saved by Mother Nature herself when the weather was overcast, which proved unfavorable for an atomic bomb drop at the Kokura Terminal which was about three miles from where Fujita worked. After the atomic bomb drops on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the Japanese government sent Fujita to study the damage that was inflicted on those areas (Marshall, 1998). It is amazing that the weather saved Dr. Theodore Fujita's life, the very living person that would make unprecedented meteorological discoveries.

I thank him for his work in the atmospheric and meteorological fields. I wish that I would have had the opportunity to meet such an intelligent man and discuss his theories. It has been ten years since his death yet his discoveries are still the foundation of what we know today about mesoscale meteorology. We dedicate this entry to him and his hard work.

(To request references, please contact us.)

Friday, January 23, 2009

We value your opinion; Take our quick survey.

Hello there. We value your input and opinion regarding our weather website and this blog. In order to ensure that we provide the most useful information for our visitors, we have created a short, dynamic survey that asks a series of questions about our site. We encourage everyone to submit their thoughts through this survey. If enough contribute their opinion, we can continue to provide some of the best weather information for Skidaway Island.

Here is the link to the survey: http://www.myskidawayisland.com/survey/survey.php?s_id=1

Thank you all in advance.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Come on Down and see the National Weather Service!

Representatives from our National Weather Service forecast office will be in Savannah this weekend. They will have a booth exhibit at the Charleston Boat Show. The meteorologists there will answer questions and accept input and comments regarding their new National Digital Forecast Database on their website at weather.gov . Their exhibit will be located outside between the parking lot E and the building. Here's the Public Information Statement released earlier today by the National Weather Service:

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE CHARLESTON SC
851 AM EST THU JAN 22 2009

...YOUR NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE AT THE CHARLESTON BOAT SHOW...

THIS FRIDAY...SATURDAY AND SUNDAY...JANUARY 23...24 AND 25...YOUR
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN CHARLESTON WILL BE PARTICIPATING AT
THE BOAT SHOW AT THE NORTH CHARLESTON CONVENTION CENTER.

UNLIKE RECENT YEARS WHEN WE WERE LOCATED INSIDE...THIS YEAR WE
WILL BE OUTSIDE NEAR THE MAIN ENTRANCE TO THE CONVENTION
CENTER...BETWEEN THE BUILDING AND PARKING LOT E.

WE WILL BE ON HAND TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTIONS ABOUT WEATHER...AND
WILL PROVIDE VARIOUS FREE HANDOUTS...FOR BOTH ADULTS AND CHILDREN.

IN ADDITION...WE WILL BE SHOWCASING OUR WEBSITE...AS WELL AS
PROVIDING OTHER SOURCES OF WHERE YOU MAY OBTAIN MARINE WEATHER
INFORMATION...FORECASTS AND DATA.

WE WILL REVIEW AND PROMOTE OUR NATIONAL DIGITAL FORECAST
DATABASE...AND WE WILL BE HAPPY TO ACCEPT YOUR COMMENTS REGARDING
OUR FORECASTS...PRODUCTS AND SERVICES.

BE SURE TO STOP BY OUR DISPLAY TABLE NEAR THE MAIN ENTRANCE TO THE
CONVENTION CENTER. WE WILL BE THERE DURING THE FOLLOWING DATES AND
TIMES...

FRIDAY...JANUARY 23...FROM NOON TO 7 PM.

SATURDAY...JANUARY 24...FROM 10 AM TO 7 PM.

SUNDAY...JANUARY 25...FROM 11 AM TO 6 PM.

WE HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE.

$$

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

More Cold Air?

We had some fairly good snowfall amounts in the low country of South Carolina. Anywhere from a trace to a half an inch fell in some places. The local storm reports out of the area showed that most of the now stayed north of a line from Beaufort to Screven. The majority of our area stayed precipitation free as the drier air moved through. I was taken back at the lack of precipitation in the area. Normally, I would be unhappy with the dry air in place but sometimes this lack of moisture in the lower levels can lead to a higher possibility of snowfall because the surface ambient temperature is colder. There have been times when the surface temperature was 40°F and snow was falling--albeit not accumulating. That wasn't the case today however it was possible and I wondered why there weren't more television personalities discussing the chance of snow flurries for the local area. I can attest to the lack of snow in the Chatham County area. As for the outlying areas, I believe for all intensive purposes that they did see a few snow flurries early today.

The National Weather Service did a good job issuing winter weather advisories and special weather statements as needed for the wintry precipitation we experienced. The weather forecast offices in Columbia and Charleston received reports of a trace to a half an inch of snowfall, mainly on grassy surfaces in the midlands of SC. The main headaches were for those traveling through the airport-hub in Charlotte, North Carolina where they received between three and six inches of snowfall repectively.

At least for the next few days, we will have cold and brisk air filtering in from the north and northwest. That trend will dominate our weather for the good part of the week and, by this weekend, we should see some moderation in temperatures, quite possibly to spring-time levels. The precipitation forecast doesn't look good. We already have a rainfall defecit at the Savannah International Airport, continuing the trend from last year. The next chance of rain will come by the end of this weekend. It's important to note that we did finish the last year with a precipitation surplus which is definitely a good thing.

The inauguration weather was splendid for this time of year. I believe the chance of snow showers in the Washington vicinity was somewhere around five percent, roughly one in twenty. Either way, the beautiful weather did materialize and gave the spectators at the Lincoln Memorial and all of Washington a great sight without having to contend Mother Nature.

Stay Warm!

Monday, January 19, 2009

Snow in the Southeast?

It looks like there could be some snow later tonight and Tuesday morning for most of northern southeast locations including Charleston, Columbia, Charlotte, and Atlanta. Some locations could receive more than one inch of frozen precipitation which is significant. The latest models indicate that as a low pressure system moves toward the southeastern coast, colder air will move in behind the system. With the increase in moisture and freezing temperatures, there is a significant chance for wintry weather across much of north and central South Carolina, northern Georgia, and the western half of North Carolina. If you have any family members in those areas, they should see a fairly good amount of snow relatively speaking.

For our area, the majority of the moisture throughout the atmosphere will stay to the north of the Chatham County and Savannah Areas. The National Weather Service in Charleston has actually included a very slight chance of snow/rain on Tuesday afternoon, right now at approx. 20 percent. I tend to concur; however, I believe most of the frozen precipitation will stay out of the immediate coastal empire and low country of South Carolina. The NWS tends to believe this as well in their most recent Area Forecast Discussion. While the threat does exist for a winter mix in the low country of South Carolina and far inland areas of the coastal empire if moisture and cold air is abundant enough, I doubt it will actually happen. So the bottom line for tomorrow--don't get too excited, we're not going to see any snow.


Just a quick note--we'll be tracking the possible frozen precipitation on the Early Waning Doppler HD radar page. You can always get the latest weather information on our website at www.myskidawayisland.com/weather/ and from the National Weather Service at http://www.erh.noaa.gov/chs/.

Have a great MLK Jr. Day!

Sunday, January 18, 2009

New Chatham County Sirens

The Chatham County Emergency Management Agency lobbied the county to purchase new tornado/emergency sirens for the local area. The sirens will complement the existing network of emergency alert units. These new sirens will be a great asset during the severe weather season, informing citizens to the potential for severe weather (e.g. tornado warnings). The below images show the old map and the newer map with pinks indicating the new coverage. Personnel from the Chatham Emergency Management Agency (CEMA) tell the media that the sirens will most likely be operational and working properly by March of 2009 if all goes as planned.

Old Sirens

New Sirens

Skidaway Island Pinpoint Doppler


Not only have we added more updated weather information and radar images, the Skidaway Island Weather Center has access to more than 140 Doppler radar sites around the United States. This capability, used in conjunction with all the different weather radar products, allows us to monitor, track, and interrogate precipitation (e.g. thunderstorms, showers, etc.) and large-scale synoptic weather features. During severe weather season, this computer application gives us the ability to streamline different data and upload that onto our web server for your accessibility. You are able to view weather radar, surface observation, and severe weather information. Below are several images showing the capabilities of the Skidaway Island Pinpoint Doppler. The first demonstrates a four-panel display of both base reflectivity and base velocity (with both having a different scan elevation tilt equaling four images). The second shows storm tracks using publicly-available SCIT data from the National Weather Service NEXRAD.

 

Monday, January 12, 2009

Generally Normal Temperatures; Several Cold Pockets

After examining various model output, I can come to one conclusion. There will be mild and seasonally-average temperatures with slightly lower precipitation. The short term MOS guidance suggests that cold--or at least marginally cold--temperatures will dominate the weather. By the end of this week (1/20), the 850mb temps show a drastic cool down. With 850mb temps of around ten below zero, I would reasonably conclude that temperatures will drop to below 30 degrees for coastal counties, and quite a few degrees below 25°F for inland areas of southeast Georgia and southern South Carolina. So the bottom line: there will be a very cold "pocket" of air coming in by the end of the week. Temperatures will again moderate and once again drop below freezing by the mid-part of next week.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Weather Center Receives Much Needed Upgrade

I sincerely thank all those who have continued to use the weather conditions on our website at the Skidaway Island Weather Center. All the hard work put into coding and establishing this weather website and our parent website has been well worth the effort. I continue to ensure that the Skidaway Island Weather Center is one of the best weather information sites for hyper-local and live weather information. I value the input from visitors and users of our weather data.

After discontinuing updates to this weather blog, I have decided to revitalize this blog with weather information, especially severe weather in our area. I am committed to giving users of the Skidaway Island Weather website with reliable, and most importantly, accurate weather and meteorological information. I will continually update and inform visitors and readers of this blog on a regular basis about meteorological phenomena occurring in our area and those of other parts of the country.

As a part of an unfaltering commitment to users of our weather data, this past month, the Skidaway Island Weather Center's website, http://www.myskidawayisland.com/weather/, received a much needed design upgrade. In a continuing effort to uphold the standards of the weather website, we redesigned and renewed our weather data website. New data and information has been made available including live Doppler radar imagery, and updating live weather web cams. In addition, our parent website which offers information related to Skidaway Island located at http://www.myskidawayisland.com/ has received a "makeover". Both websites include more updated web design rendering methodology in accordance with current web standards.

We have also written information regarding lightning and safety. That is also located at http://www.myskidawayisland.com/lightning/.

Patrick Prokop, from WTOC-DT/TV, has also used our weather data on on-air broadcasts.

Until the next update,