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LOL, Drudge actually has a record cold temp story linked RIGHT NOW!!!!!!

"Excuse" - you used the correct term. If you remember, back in the day when the invasion into Iraq/Afghanistan was still fresh you could hear a lot of saber rattling by the US government against Iran - which coincidentally (or should I say conveniently?) lies exactly between both those countries. Now that the Taliban has regained strength in Afghanistan and Iraq's situation is deteriorating (every single day there are dozens of people killed, even though it's 110+ degrees F outside!) Washington's rhetoric has toned down. The strategy has not worked because of the ignorance and short-sightedness of the perpetrators and against all opposition they will try to remain there because it's not only about Iraq, but about the whole region.

I'm pretty sure if the invasions had gone as "planned" there would be no big problem for the administration to find a pretext, an excuse if you may, to attack Iran - with the same support it got from congress that it got for the Iraq invasion; and I believe that this time they would have ignored the UN all together (remember, last time Rumsfeld was still running around with a vial of "anthrax" and displaying satellite images of Iraq's WMD production facilities to the UN). While Desert Storm and even the invasion of Afghanistan were sanctioned by the UN (i.e. had international support) the 2003 attack on Iraq wasn't; the administration was able to convince the American people of Saddam's threat, it was not as successful convincing people of other countries who are not under the influence of US media.

They claimed to be victims at the time, (and the article appears at archive.org so it's not a fake), but so what? One way they are appeasing their benefactor. The other way, they are under duress. Either way they can be manipulated.

If that were the only problem, it could be ignored, but the rest of the story is rotten too. Raids, posturing and gags are all made to cover up things that stink.

The larger pattern is an administration that's corrupt, abusive and thin skinned. I was willing to ignore early claims of favoritism for reporters, but the stories just keep piling up. People are being punished for doing their jobs and say things that are detrimental to some big dumb company. Instead of admitting their mistakes, they are making things worse by trying to hide the truth itself.

They have treated him to a pop inspection, kind of like they did Iraq before the invasion:

Federal officials are expected today to finish a surprise inspection of the hurricane center, to see if it can fulfill its mission under Bill Proenza.

Want to bet the result is a smear job?

The attacks on the integrity of his policy shows up the problems of scientific publishing more than it does anything else. Jeff Master's critiques look solid, but he points to a big problem:

It will probably appear in the October-November time frame, according to the publisher. This raises an immediate problem, since only a privileged few are able to read unpublished research. This limits the possibilities for an informed debate on the issue, and basing important policy decisions on unpublished research is thus normally to be avoided. However, making accurate hurricane forecasts is important enough that such considerations can be excused.

The article should be widely available so I don't have to take Master's opinion of it. Weather Underground, because of the Weather Service Scandal is a suspect source of information. They did their best to cripple free updates from the national weather service and I'm still angry at them for it. Even if Master's claims are valid, they don't warrent the attention Proenza is getting.

Really what you see here is a scientist being smeared and muzzled. It's not the first time scientists at the NOAA have been gagged. Only bad policy has to be defended by firing people and shutting up the rest.

Proenza's problems and forcasting are just the tip of the melting iceburg of this scandal. QuikSCAT provides information about storm intensity, a key point in global warming research. It looks like the Bush administration is willing to sacrifice forcasting accuracy in order to bury evidence of global warming. There's more where that came from.

When they release a version that will work for me I'll be happy

The http://wunderground.com/ site has multiple functions that cause a MS error message, which I don't allow to send information to MS, and then it closes the browser. I used the bug report feature in the browser when I restarted it.

"Everyone had to scale back"? Have you seen this year's April predictions for the hurricane season? Pretty much the same as last year's. Weather nuts say that they're covering their asses, trying not to underestimate.

Of course, the media doesn't note that April predictions show no skill - they're not any better than just guessing the average. (Search for "skill" in the researchers' papers, or look here: http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comme nt.html?entrynum=646&tstamp=200704 .) It's mostly the media's fault that all these claims are so overblown (including the claim that Hurricane Katrina the-specific-storm is connected directly to global warming). Even those agreeing with anthropogenic global warming have to try to ignore the media's hype.

Try to picture http://wunderground.com/ clusters switching from Slackware to Ubuntu while serving sometimes hundreds of millions in time/mission critical purpose.

Or picture Yahoo.com switching to Ubuntu from FreeBSD.

Or IBM installing Apache 2 to all mainframes tomorrow morning without testing.

I am getting a bit tired of Ubuntu fans who never understand the major/main focus of Slackware/Debian/AIX/FreeBSD. OK, enjoy your eye candy desktop but don't try to change every distro.

It was 81 degrees F in New Jersey yesterday, so hell didn't freeze over.

Fact: It's going to be 69 degrees in New York City before the second week in March. That's absurdly early for that kind of weather. And if I had the "scientific" mind of some of these critics, I'd look in the Almanac and see that the weather has spiked like this before in March. What I'd leave out is the FREQUENCY at which this is occurring. It's not isolated incidents or simple deviation from the average.

This is a mind-bogglingly ridiculous statement. A single forcast of a few warm days this week is evidence of global warming, and weather records showing that this has happened before are inadmissable? For the record, the warmest it's supposed to be this week is 64 degrees, which is 15 degrees above average. Saturday is expected to be 38, which is 12 degrees below the average. Last week it was much colder than that. Anecdotes of this sort are totally useless. Future weather forcasts are not fact. It's not before the second week of March, it's the end of the second week of March....

Also, hell freezing over.

It already has:

Conditions in Hell, MI

Read the substantiated facts:
  http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/WG1AR4_SPM_Appro ved_05Feb.pdf IPCC science summary v4
http://www.realclimate.org/
http://www.wunderground.com/education/928.asp links to governmental agencies opinions.
http://www.wunderground.com/education/hoax.asp refutation of unsupportive satellite data:
http://www.wunderground.com/education/stateoffear. asp refutation of M.C's state of fear:

Distribution of EMS produced by our local star:
http://www.tak2000.com/data/planets/solar-rad.gif
or
http://www.eas.slu.edu/People/CEGraves/Eas138/fg02 _18.jpg

Read the substantiated facts:
  http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/WG1AR4_SPM_Appro ved_05Feb.pdf IPCC science summary v4
http://www.realclimate.org/
http://www.wunderground.com/education/928.asp links to governmental agencies opinions.
http://www.wunderground.com/education/hoax.asp refutation of unsupportive satellite data:
http://www.wunderground.com/education/stateoffear. asp refutation of M.C's state of fear:

Distribution of EMS produced by our local star:
http://www.tak2000.com/data/planets/solar-rad.gif
or
http://www.eas.slu.edu/People/CEGraves/Eas138/fg02 _18.jpg

Read the substantiated facts:
  http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/WG1AR4_SPM_Appro ved_05Feb.pdf IPCC science summary v4
http://www.realclimate.org/
http://www.wunderground.com/education/928.asp links to governmental agencies opinions.
http://www.wunderground.com/education/hoax.asp refutation of unsupportive satellite data:
http://www.wunderground.com/education/stateoffear. asp refutation of M.C's state of fear:

Distribution of EMS produced by our local star:
http://www.tak2000.com/data/planets/solar-rad.gif
or
http://www.eas.slu.edu/People/CEGraves/Eas138/fg02 _18.jpg

Sites like http://www.wunderground.com/ take in feeds from small weather stations (schools, homes, etc.) and display them in a list. At least in Chicago there are enough to get a good idea of the real weather (not just at O'Hare).

I think the idea of this thread, and as I said before, without getting into a paper pissing contest of academic citations, I have been quite specific in that I do not believe the CO2 cycle and man are directly related in this problem.

I think the problem is much more complex and it involves the natural climate changes that happen to the earth with regards to Solar activity, and vulcanism specifically. I certainly agree there is plenty of evidence to suggest that the biosphere in various degrees, regulates the carbon cycle on the planet but I think mans roll is nebulous due to the lack of good sensor data on the ground and in space.

When the powers that be get around to putting some good gear in orbit and on the ground/oceans my position may change.

The point is I do not think we are directly responsible for global warming. We may play a roll, but exactly what that roll is beyond burning down the trees, and running cars I do not believe is terribly clear. For example, if the point source emissions could be localized for CO2 and there was a direct relation between uptake of CO2 and the cutting down of trees, the simple solution would be to plant more trees.

Problem is, you can't make much money off of doing that, so that tanks that solution.

But I do not even think there is enough research to suggest such a simple solution as planting more trees would work. I think we may find out rather harshly when the last of the Amazon rain forest is finally torched. Fortunately, that uncontrolled experiment will come to an end within the next 10-20 years and we should know the results soon. Could be a hard lesson though....

Hence the debate is largely about politics and money, in my opinion and not about good science.

I also never said there is a vast democratic party conspiracy. There could very well be a republican party conspiracy supressing science for human induced global warming, which would be par for the course if you believe this is all about politics and money.

But this game is played by so many DOGMATICS like my friend here, and politicians that the whole question of human induced climate change has become a circus act.

http://www.wunderground.com/education/hoax.asp

The above thread, if you like conspiracy theories is probably the only area where I and the current presidential administration agree on. The models need better measurements, which means more funding for better space, ocean and land gear to measure not just CO2 but solar radiation and vulcanism and other problematic gases such as methane. The rest of the report is dubious at best, and is a great example of how both political parties in the US distort the facts.

I think the models used for atmospheric regulation are indeed on the right track. But with computers, GARBAGE IN equals GARBAGE out, and better more refined measurements of the dynamics of global climate change need to be more precisely measured to start improving atmospheric modeling before we take any steps.

Problem is, not a whole lot of money in building a "Biosphere Sensor GRID" as it would cost a lot of money to operate. Hence, that won't see the light of day anytime soon.

I personally think, that the Kyoto treaty for example is nothing but vieled attempt to keep the 3 billion of that can't find enough food on a daily basis in check.

The protocol also seems to be a bit whacked if not unrealistic. For example, if your in the minority like I am, and believe that the Biospeher could probably help moderate climate change to a tolerable degree (Like it has always done throughout history which is a given and no research is needed..), then the Kyoto accord is worthless. I specifically site the protcols lack of real direction for developing nations, which are the ones ironically destroying most of the biospeheres carbon regulation capabilities: Translation: Stop cutting down the trees.

The whole protocol is borked, instead focu

1. The Stratosphere, and other higher atmospheric layers, are actually cooling
2. The lower atmosphere is warming
3. Increased solar radiation would warm both the upper and lower atmosphere
4. The fact that the upper atmosphere is not warming argues against a significant contribution from increased solar radiation

OCT 1 2006 to JAN 9 2007: 4.90 in / 12.52 cm
source

OCT 1 2005 to JAN 9 2006: 8.43 in / 21.49 cm
source

OK so we're not too far off from last year's precipitation amount.

Also, for good measure. 219.5" snow fall was recorded for 2005-2006. This seems to translate to 15.63 in / 39.86 cm.

Expanding from there... (219.5" / 15.63") * 4.90" = 68.8" approximated for 2006-2007 so far. 40.5" fallen so far.

OCT 1 2006 to JAN 9 2007: 4.90 in / 12.52 cm
source

OCT 1 2005 to JAN 9 2006: 8.43 in / 21.49 cm
source

OK so we're not too far off from last year's precipitation amount.

Also, for good measure. 219.5" snow fall was recorded for 2005-2006. This seems to translate to 15.63 in / 39.86 cm.

Expanding from there... (219.5" / 15.63") * 4.90" = 68.8" approximated for 2006-2007 so far. 40.5" fallen so far.

OCT 1 2006 to JAN 9 2007: 4.90 in / 12.52 cm
source

OCT 1 2005 to JAN 9 2006: 8.43 in / 21.49 cm
source

OK so we're not too far off from last year's precipitation amount.

Also, for good measure. 219.5" snow fall was recorded for 2005-2006. This seems to translate to 15.63 in / 39.86 cm.

Expanding from there... (219.5" / 15.63") * 4.90" = 68.8" approximated for 2006-2007 so far. 40.5" fallen so far.

There is only one thing to see here and it's this fantastic graph.

http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/2007/alldec. gif

Climate change is real and we should be worried. However, drawing arbitrary straight lines through random data is not going to convince anyone.

They allow a Russian guy to register wunderground.mobi , here comes the dotcom cybersquatting again.

Check http://pc.mtld.mobi/whois/index.php , put wunderground.mobi to search box and see the result yourself. While on it, check slashdot.mobi , it is taken too.

Weather Underground is one of the oldest sites on web (they started with Telnet/Gopher!) and they have a dedicated mobile (WAP) version at

http://m.wunderground.com/

So, a Russian guy can get that wunderground.mobi yes? What guarantees there won't be some "Enter your credit card details for plus access" on that page?

Cybersquatting in 2006, great. The question is: They are that naive or is this on purpose?

Actually, its 90% chance of rain today, and partly cloudly for the rest of the week...

Hell, Michigan http://www.wunderground.com/US/48169.html

I cannot believe that this tripe was not only unchallenged, but modded "Insightful".

First off, we have this claim: "We have a President that has failed at every single thing he's done." Well, I can say he did two things successfully (got elected and then got re-elected) so there's an outrageous lie. But lets go on:

"We've gone from disaster to disaster" right, so nothing else has happened in the last 5 years. really. hmm.... it must suck to be a 5 year old. after all, your entire life has been one disaster after another.

"we lost the World Trade Center" Sorry, we didn't *lose* the WTC. It was blown up. A group of determined terrorists, who were well financed and fairly well organized managed to perform three acts of unspeakable terror on one day. They had planned (from what I've read) at least 3 others, which were thrwarted. (The plane which was heading for the capital but crashed in Pennsylvania, and at least two attacks on the west coast which were thwarted by the fact that the terrorists forgot about time zones and the airports were closed before they could attack). But of course this was Bush's fault because he, as president, is all knowing and all seeing.

"we lost New Orleans" Really? I saw in the news that Mardi gras went off in New Orleans just a week or so ago and the NBA is going to be playing in New Orleans very soon (possibly even today). Sounds like the town isn't exactly dead.

"we lost Bin Laden" We got the other guy though, Hussain. and the best thing about that is that he's being tried in Iraq. The fact that we can't capture a single guy who's been keeping a low profile and has good friends who's pocketbooks look like the US treasury doesn't suprise me at all. But then again, that's Bush's fault. Of course if we'd caught him, then it would have cost to much and that would also be Bush's fault. Let me guess, you don't like him do you?

"we are losing every day in Iraq" we are? last I saw Iraq was struggling to put together their government. Read much history? The US wasn't built in a day. In fact, it took 2 years after the War for Independence ended before there was a Constitution. And 13 years after the Declaration of Independence. The fact that Iraq's government isn't stable doesn't suprise me. But it would be irresponsible for us to pull our backing for the regime just because we don't like who they elected.

"We watched over days while Katrina slowly destroyed New Orleans and, just like on 9/11, he did nothing, nothing at all" What did you do? did you give anything? did you drive to Louisiana and try and rescue someone? Did you even pay attention, or did you just listen to what idiots were saying. For example, did you know that the Governor of Louisiana sent FEMA workers home AFTER Katrina hit but before the levees broke believing that the levees wouldn't fail. And then failed to call FEMA back immediately? But again, its Bush's fault. His fault that the Hurricane even hit. and that it strengthened by some 100 MPH in the 2 days just before hitting New Orleans.

on a side note, I am simply shocked by the rapidity of this storm and its behavior. Here is a link to tracking data on Katrina http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200512.asp ?imgfeature=image&textfeature=track

On the 26th of August it went throught the florida keys and had just upgraded from a Tropical Storm to a Hurricane with 75 MPH winds. on the 27th its winds were 100 MPH and it was moving directly west. By the 28th it hadn't moved far but was still gathering strength. Then all of a sudden, it makes a 90 degree turn north, gains 65 MPH in winds (from 110 MPH to 175 MPH) and crashes into Louisiana, florida, Mississippi, and Alabama. By August 31 it was gone. not just through New Orleans, but dead. We're talking 5 days from the Florida keys to hitting the gulf coast to dying IN TENNESSEE. Not something easy to

I would trust anything more the The Day After Tomorrow.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5058474
http://www.wunderground.com/education/thedayafter. asp
http://www.whoi.edu/institutes/occi/currenttopics/ abruptclimate_dayafter.html

You know what's kind of funny, I don't get junk snail mail anymore.

Of course, there was some... unpleasantness that caused some levee breaches, some flooding of the mail-sorting equipment, and some Post Masters halting delivery of such things. But, hey, no more junk mail!

Of course, my wife doesn't get her magazines anymore either, which is a pain.

The weather is rather pleasant right now in Baghdad.

http://www.wunderground.com/education/abruptclimat e.asp

Here is the part I wanted to reference: "Since the Great Ocean Conveyor belt is driven in part by differences in ocean water density, if one can pump enough fresh water into the ocean in the key areas on either side of Greenland where the Gulf Stream waters cool and sink, this will lower the ocean's salinity (and therefore its density) enough so that the waters there no longer sink. The Atlantic conveyor belt and Gulf Stream current will then shut down in just a few years, dramatically altering the climate. "

Also here is a write up specifically dealing with the "science" of "The Day After Tomorrow."

http://www.wunderground.com/education/thedayafter. asp

http://www.wunderground.com/education/abruptclimat e.asp

Here is the part I wanted to reference: "Since the Great Ocean Conveyor belt is driven in part by differences in ocean water density, if one can pump enough fresh water into the ocean in the key areas on either side of Greenland where the Gulf Stream waters cool and sink, this will lower the ocean's salinity (and therefore its density) enough so that the waters there no longer sink. The Atlantic conveyor belt and Gulf Stream current will then shut down in just a few years, dramatically altering the climate. "

Also here is a write up specifically dealing with the "science" of "The Day After Tomorrow."

http://www.wunderground.com/education/thedayafter. asp

(Rolls Eyes)

No shit, Delta's for real... That's not what the GGP was making up. He was pulling the idea that the end of the hurricane season had passed out of his ass.

I live in Florida. I carefully watch both NOAA's sites and the blogs of climatologists like Jeff Masters.

And by the way, according to him there are two more potential areas to watch right now, "in the mid-Atlantic just west of Delta's current position," and "The region just north of Panama may get active, as wind shear levels are expected to be low the next five days."

Weather Underground ( http://wunderground.com/ ) was awarded " Enterprise All-Star Award" from Network World. Especially after handling 14 million hits in Katrina.

http://www.networkworld.com/allstar/2005/112105-ot her.html

Reading the article, one thing didn't surprise me at all:

"Weather Underground uses a trimmed-down version of Slackware, one of the only distributions of Linux available in the mid-1990s when Schwerzler was at U-M. In addition, the servers have no hard drives and support Preboot Execution Environment boot, which means they are configurable and deployable via the network"

You should read rest of the article about the stuff they do there to manage such amounts of data. "No bullshit" attitude of Slackware helps? I bet!

A politician who kept his word!? What is this world coming to? First open source software, then municipal WiFi, and now an honest politician. You know it is getting a little chilly right now. I better get my spare blankets ready; Lucifer might want his favor returned soon.

http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200513.asp http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200514.asp http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200509.asp

http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200513.asp http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200514.asp http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200509.asp

http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200513.asp http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200514.asp http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/at200509.asp

So what you're saying, is that Michael Chrichton doesn't know science.

Could of told you that before.

I was thinking the same thing. FYI, here is the link directly to the Weather Underground Personal Weather Station (PWS) page:
http://www.wunderground.com/weatherstation/index.a sp

How funny, I'm working on this today.

I use a weather station made by La Crosse.

The station measures temperature, rain, humidity, wind speed and even calculates the dew point. It also functions as an atomic clock receiver.

The sensors are outside, and connect to a base station inside the house through a wired or wireless (433 MHz) connection. The base station connects to a PC over a serial connection. The sensors are battery powered. Mine have been running for 6 months off of NiMH batteries.

The stations come with software for Windows, but you can also use connect via Linux using the Open2300 project.

2300 includes most everything you need: The C programs read from the device via a serial port and write the information to a flat file or to an optional MySQL database.

Using a set of PHP scripts, you can host the data on any Apache webserver. As an alternative, you can upload the data to Weather Underground, or even broadcast it over a HAM radio (Citizens Weather-- but I know nothing about this).

The weather stations also listens to the NIST Atomic Clock in Boulder, Colorado. I'm looking at ways of using my weather station to set the time for my NTP service.

It's all pretty straightforward, and requires very little technical knowledge if you use the vendor-supplied versions of MySQL, PHP (With GD) & Apache.

My station for Berkeley has been setup for a month, but I need to remount the temperature sensors to a location that doesn't collect as much heat. It's not really 85F in Berkeley right now-- it's 85F right outside the office door, and a cool 80F inside.

How funny, I'm working on this today.

I use a weather station made by La Crosse.

The station measures temperature, rain, humidity, wind speed and even calculates the dew point. It also functions as an atomic clock receiver.

The sensors are outside, and connect to a base station inside the house through a wired or wireless (433 MHz) connection. The base station connects to a PC over a serial connection. The sensors are battery powered. Mine have been running for 6 months off of NiMH batteries.

The stations come with software for Windows, but you can also use connect via Linux using the Open2300 project.

2300 includes most everything you need: The C programs read from the device via a serial port and write the information to a flat file or to an optional MySQL database.

Using a set of PHP scripts, you can host the data on any Apache webserver. As an alternative, you can upload the data to Weather Underground, or even broadcast it over a HAM radio (Citizens Weather-- but I know nothing about this).

The weather stations also listens to the NIST Atomic Clock in Boulder, Colorado. I'm looking at ways of using my weather station to set the time for my NTP service.

It's all pretty straightforward, and requires very little technical knowledge if you use the vendor-supplied versions of MySQL, PHP (With GD) & Apache.

My station for Berkeley has been setup for a month, but I need to remount the temperature sensors to a location that doesn't collect as much heat. It's not really 85F in Berkeley right now-- it's 85F right outside the office door, and a cool 80F inside.

It is wunderground.com, not weatherunderground.com...

Accurate link.

Well i dont know if you saw this but rita is now a CAT 5.

Id get the fuck out of there dude becuase your house is going to get blown away. UPS's and all.

Look at the current satellite for North America. There are 5 huricanes at the same time! Map.

If I want radar, http://wunderground.com/ has nexrad which blows everything else away (storm tracking, angle adjustments, configurable maps)

I haven't found anything (at least as far as radar and other animated maps go) that was more useful and comprehensive than this one: http://www.rap.ucar.edu/weather/

Give me the page I request, nothing more please. No added adds, no extra info about the weather or some moviestars latest romance. There will always be better info on a specialized site for that.

Quick, can someone post a current weather report for Hell, please?

Weather for Hel

Close enough? ;)

Here's your weather report for Hell. ;-)

Currently 33 degrees C outside in Memphis, TN

I'm not sure it is possible to pull this off. Isn't the north Atlantic cold at this time of year?

From this surface temperature map it would appear that if he swam at a latitude of 30 degrees North, the temperature is around 70 Fahrenheit or 21 Centigrade all the way to Spain. From Spain to South America it's even warmer (85 Fahrenheit/28 Centigrade). Up beside Norway, it's only 55 Fahreheit (12 Centigrade), so he would probably need a survival suit.