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Heat in the Great Lakes, Snow Out West

Posted:Sat, 23 Sep 2017 16:25:42 +0000

The top pic. is snow on the ground this AM at Yellowstone N. P. Much of the park is covered with snow this AM.

This map shows where there is snow on the ground this (Sat.) am – that represents 5% of the contiguous U.S. While I can’t confirm this…I’ll assume that’s a record amount of the U.S. with snow on the ground on any 9/23. I can look back to 2003 and most years it’s at 0.0% on 9/23.

A solid snow cover is reported at the Logan Pass Parking Lot in Glacier N.P. Back in 2009, a scientist speculated that because of “global warming” the glaciers in Glacier Nat. Park could be gone by 2020 – he may have to push that date back a few months.

This pic. was June 2, 2017 taken by a crew that was clearing a road of snow. On the far left you can see some pretty big drifts remaining at the Logan Pass Visitor’s Center. Last year was a big year for snow in the park and throughout much of the West. Here’s pics. of very heavy snow near Glacier N.P. last February.

Here’s the Sat. AM Arctic snow cover map – note the amount of snow on the ground already in Siberia. There is a correlation between early snow cover in Siberia and cold/snowy winters in the Great Lakes and Northeast U.S. (I just sent in my $$ for my snowplow service for the winter).

This is North American sea ice. The extent is greater now than the 10-year average.
Michigan Warmer than Death Valley!

Posted:Sat, 23 Sep 2017 07:00:06 +0000

Grand Rapids and Traverse City MI reached 95 degrees on Friday. That was 9° warmer than Death Valley CA (2nd day in a row we’ve been warmer than the usual hottest spot in the U.S.), 19° hotter than Las Vegas NV and 42° warmer than Salt Lake City. The 95° reading was a record high temp. for Sept. 22 and also (for the 2nd day in a row), the hottest temp. so late in the season. G.R. and TVC were warmer than any weather station in Florida or Hawaii. We were only 5° shy of the warmest temp. in the U.S., which was a sizzling 100° at Hill City KS. I saw that Squaw Valley CA had a high/low of 36/23 on Fri. Other cool high temps. out West: 37 Dillon MT, 38 Great Falls and Lewistown MT, 40 at Cody WY, 42 at Ely NV, 48 at Idaho Falls (fans were in winter coats at the Boise State/Virginia football game Fri. evening) and 52 at Bend OR. I don’t have the climate books at home, but I think this was the first time we’ve had back-to-back 95-degree days since 2012. BTW, the weather station at Mt. Pleasant had a high of 96 on Fri. – that weather station appears to me to be reading a couple degrees too high right now. That may be related to the drought – any of the mets. at CMU notice that? It was a little cooler at the Lake Michigan shore, where the high temp. was 79.2 at the Muskegon Beach. The water temp. of Reeds Lake was still up at 75 at 3 am Sat.

Record highs were set at all the reporting stations in N. Lower MI on Friday. Look at the outflow boundary from the N. Michigan t-storms Friday.

A significant part of the Western U.S. mountains woke up to snow on the ground Fri. AM. 3.5% of the contiguous U.S. had a snow cover Friday. From 2003 thru 2016, the average snow cover in the contiguous U.S. was 0.3% and no year was higher than 2.0%. Look at the snow in the Sierras.

Also: Here’s a graphic that shows what FEMA is doing to help Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Earthquake rescue teams from the U.S. are in Mexico City still working on finding survivors. “Lee” has regenerated into a Tropical Storm far out in the central Atlantic and no threat to land.

Maria is east of the Bahamas and moving north. It should move mainly between the U.S. and Bermuda, but possible close enough to bring a windy, rainy day to E. North Carolina. As I write this, it’s still a Category 3 storm, but should weaken very slowly as it moves north. Here’s a month of tropical activity in 52 seconds. Dam failure still possible in Puerto Rico. Video of the dam failure. Jose producing big waves off Nantucket (why were they out in the boat in a Tropical Storm?). Flooding in Puerto Rico.

Two e-quakes of magnitude 5.6 and 5.8 occurred off the coast of N. California – no tsunami was generated. Possible volcano in Indonesia? 96-year-old ranger. Nice example of a thunderstorm anvil – moving out ahead of the storm.
Drought Causing Leaves to Turn Brown & Fall Off

Posted:Sat, 23 Sep 2017 05:58:10 +0000

I took this picture south of Crockery Lake Fri. PM. The leaves on many trees are turning brown and falling off a little early because of the drought. Today (Sat.) will be the 16th day without any rain in G.R. and we’ve had just 32% of average rainfall in G.R. since June 29. The overnight GFS model run has the chance of rain for G.R. at 1% today, 4% Sunday, 8% Monday, 18% Tuesday, 56% Wednesday, 41% Thursday and 45% on Friday…we stay in the warm air for the first half of the week…then it gives G.R. a high of 77 on Weds., 68 on Thurs. and 58 next Friday.
Seeing Storms 100 Miles Away

Posted:Sat, 23 Sep 2017 05:52:13 +0000

I took the picture above just south of Crockery Lake. Looking southeast you could see some cumulonimbus and towering cumulus clouds. These showers/t-showers were about 100 miles away.

This is a snippet from the G.R. radar storm total precipitation map. Forget the light blue…you can see there was rain in Hillsdale, SW Jackson and a couple of dots in E. Calhoun County. The only rainfall total I saw was 0.09″ in Hillsdale County. The Hillsdale Airport does not report rainfall, but I saw their visibility dropped from 10 miles to 1.75 miles (that would be because of rain) and the temp. dropped from 90 at 4:35 pm to 82 at 5:15 pm. The showers and storms were “pulse” – meaning they pop up, move very little, then die off while another shower erupts nearby. This happened today when it was hottest and all the showers and storms were gone by mid-evening as temperatures cooled.
G.R. one of hottest places in U.S. right now

Posted:Fri, 22 Sep 2017 16:32:50 +0000

Noon EDT temps: Grand Rapids MI 90, Honolulu HI 77, Yuma AZ 68, Las Vegas NV 61, Palm Springs CA 68, New Smyrna Beach FL 75 (raining). Other noon temps: 89 Holland (airport), S. Haven (airport), 88 Ionia, Mt. Pleasant, Traverse City, 87 Battle Creek, Benton Harbor (airport), 86 Kalamazoo and Cadillac, 83 at St. James on Beaver Island (SSW wind coming down the length of the island), 80 Mackinac Island. Pic. is the Muskegon Channel – one boat – someone had the day off). It is cooler at the beach…temp. shortly after noon was 77.0 at S. Haven Beach and 76.5 at the Muskegon Beach. High school football games involving Forest Hills Central, Northview, Rockford and Grand Haven are pushed back to 7:30 p.m. Friday because of the high temperatures.

Strong t-storms moving across the U.P. at midday – 1″ diameter hail at Keweenaw Bay and Laurium, nickel-sized hail at Gay and Michigamme, dime-sized hail at Calumet and Redridge, 1/2″ hail at Champion – tree down near Ironwood and power line down at Marenisco. Gusts to 46 mph at Freda and 41 mph at Ontonagon. This is day 15 in a row without a drop of rain in Grand Rapids. Rainfall yesterday totaled 2.87″ at Dewitt and 2.54″ at Richland.

The water temp. this AM at Reeds Lake is up to 76. At 12:30, here’s buoy temps: S. Haven 70.5 (waves 6″), Port Sheldon 69.5, Muskegon 68.4, Ludington 68.0.

Also – can you imagine trying to build this? Check out this video…from not too far northwest of Madrid, Spain.
It’s the Autumn Equinox

Posted:Fri, 22 Sep 2017 11:00:40 +0000

Today is the Autumn Equinox in the Northern Hemisphere. The official time that fall arrives is 4:02 pm. At that moment, the sun would be directly overhead at solar noon over the Equator. The word “equinox” means “equal night”. On both the Spring and Autumn Equinoxes, ever point on Earth gets 12 hours of possible sunshine. Well, not exactly…we do get a few minutes extra because of two things. First, the sunlight bends a little as it enters the Earth’s atmosphere. Second, we don’t define sunrise and sunset from the middle of the sun. Sunrise occurs when the first second of sunlight appears over a totally flat horizon. Sunset is the second the last tip of the sun disappears from a totally flat horizon. Today the sun will “set” at the North Pole (not to appear until the Spring Equinox next March) and it will rise at the South Pole and stay above the horizon for the next 6 months. It’s a good day to check out the webcam at the South Pole. Check out the current temperatures at the South Pole. The South Pole is significantly colder than the North Pole. That’s because it’s a continent and the Pole is at a relatively high elevation of 9,301 feet above sea level. Most of that 9,301 feet is ice. The warmest temperature ever recorded at the South Pole was +9.9F and the coldest was -117.0F. It’s an interesting place – there are no mosquitoes, no snakes, no plants..you can’t get dirty because there’s no dirt…just ice and snow and sky. The United States South Pole Station has been manned since 1956. Image from NASA – click to enlarge.

Also: Another earthquake just off the coast of Mexico. Hurricane season isn’t over. The west edge of Tropical Storm Jose is battering eastern MA. At 3 am, Nantucket Island reported a north wind at 36 mph, gusting to 47 mph. Trees down in the Boston Area and coastal flooding. Jose is the 7th longest-lived tropical cyclone in the Atlantic in the satellite era (since 1967). Frost and temps. below freezing this AM in Scotland. Early snow in Yosemite N.P.
Cooler Pattern Late Next Week

Posted:Fri, 22 Sep 2017 03:25:27 +0000

This is the 8-14 Day Temperature Outlook for Sept. 25 – Oct. 5 from the Weather Prediction Center. Michigan is “in the blue” and that means there is a good chance that temperatures will be cooler than average. The average high/low for that period is 66/47. This will be a big chance from the unseasonably warm weather we have here now.

This is the 8-14 day rainfall outlook. The overall dry pattern is likely to continue into early October.
Grand Rapids Hotter than Death Valley!

Posted:Fri, 22 Sep 2017 02:47:40 +0000

Grand Rapids had a high temperature of 95 degrees on Thursday. That was higher than ANY high temperature in the state of Florida…it was 13 deg. warmer than the high in Las Vegas NV and (drum roll) it was 7 deg. warmer than the high in Death Valley CA (often the hottest place in the U.S.

The 95-degree temperature was a record high temperature for Sept. 21. It was also the warmest temp. we have ever had this late in the season…and record highs are likely Friday and over the Weekend.

Other high temperatures today included 95 at Ionia, Charlotte and Lansing.

This is the Lake Express Ferry heading out of the Muskegon Channel at 4:50 pm headed toward Milwaukee. Temperatures were a bit cooler at Lake Michigan. The high temp. was 76.8 at the Muskegon Beach and 82.0 at the South Haven Lighthouse.

This is the Chicago GLERL camera at the water intake, which is about 2.75 miles east of downtown Chicago out in the lake. The weather station there had a high temp. Thurs. of 88.0 at 2 pm. When that occurred the wind was southeast and the humidity was 39.7%. The next hour the wind was due east (coming over a lot more water) and the temp. had dropped to 80.6…the humidity had gone back up to 60.4%
Who Had Rain Thurs. PM

Posted:Fri, 22 Sep 2017 01:49:44 +0000

Friday will likely be the 15th day in a row without a drop of rain in Grand Rapids (there is a slight – 20% – chance of an afternoon shower or storm southeast of Kent County today). G.R. has had only 0.56″ of rain this month. The average for Sept. 1-21 in 3.01″. Since 6/29, Grand Rapids has had only 3.4″ of rain, compared to an average of 10.51″ for June 30 – Sept. 21. That’s just 32% of average rainfall.

This is Storm Total Rainfall from the Grand Rapids radar. You can see the areas that saw rain today. A few spots got a lot of rain, but many areas had nothing. During the late afternoon, you could look off to the east or south and see the tops of the storms. The Grand River at Grand Rapids is at 76% of average flow this Thurs. evening. The Kalamazoo River at New Richmond is running at 75% of average flow and the St. Joseph River at Niles is showing 86% of average flow.

Here’s a pic. of a cumulonimbus (thunderstorm) cloud from Jack Martin. There appears to be a pileus or cap cloud at the top of the storm.

This is the amount of rain forecast by the Weather Prediction Center…goes all the way thru next Tuesday. It continues dry in Lower Michigan, while the rains are in the Plains.
Record to Near Record Heat

Posted:Thu, 21 Sep 2017 06:11:38 +0000

These are the Severe Weather Outlook maps for today, tomorrow and the next day. Parts of Lower Michigan remain in the General (not severe) T-Storm Outlook for the next 3 days. Consider yourself lucky if you get some rain…most or all of the time it will be dry. Storms in Wisconsin Weds. PM produced hail up to 2″ in diameter, but they lost support as they tried to move across the lake. We have a slight chance of a shower or storm today, but many areas will stay dry. We’re into day 14 without rain here in G.R. and we have officially in G.R. had a third of average rainfall since 6/29.

2 pm update: Grand Rapids has tied a daily record high (set in 1908) at 92. It’s also 92 in Ionia, Lansing (record daily high there is 94) and Chicago. It’s 91 in Kalamazoo and Battle Creek, 90 in Marshall, 89 in Coldwater, 88 at Mt. Pleasant, 87 at the airports in Holland and Benton Harbor, 84 in Big Rapids and Muskegon (airport) and 81 at Ludington (airport). It’s much cooler at Lake Michigan – it’s 73 on the beach at Muskegon and 75 on the beach at S. Haven. Reeds Lake water temp. 75 – buoy temps. at Lake Michigan: S. Haven 69, Holland 68, Muskegon 68 and Ludington 67.

This is sunset in Muskegon Weds. night with the sun setting into the tops of the thunderstorms in Wisconsin. The Muskegon Beach had a warm high temp. of 81.1 at 9 pm Weds. and the S. Haven Lighthouse reached 85.3. The Chicago water intake (2 3/4 miles out in the lake) had a high of 86.5, and they were still 80.8 at 1 am. There’s some hot air off to our southwest…high of 92 in Chicago was a daily record, 96 in Springfield IL and 97 in St. Louis! The latest 90-deg. temp. in G.R. is Sept. 29. I expect cooler air to move in toward the end of the month, but it stays hot to next Tues. The high of 90 at Muskegon Weds. tied for hottest day of the year in Muskegon. Muskegon was 3 deg. warmer than Daytona Beach FL.

Buoy water temps: Ludington 67, Muskegon and Holland 68 and Holland 69. At mid-afternoon, Reeds Lake had a water temp. of 73.

Regional and local radar maps should update automatically.

Snow in Alberta, Canada – there was snow down to the mountains of Wyoming. High temps. were cool out there…49 at Missoula MT., 48 at Spokane WI, 41 at W. Yellowstone.

Finally, floods won’t stop this train in India.

Links: Grand Rapids radar, Northern Michigan radar, Milwaukee radar, Northern I ndiana radar , Chicago radar , Detroit radar, Regional radar, the Updated GRR NWS Short Term Discussion. College of DuPage Radar Map (pick any radar in the U.S.), College of DuPage Grand Rapids radar, the West Michigan Lightning Tracker, National Lightning Tracker, the local warning/advisory map, the National warning/watch/advisory map, and a surface weather map. You can checkout the latest Grand Rapids NWS discussion, the Northern Indiana NWS discussion (includes the Michigan Counties that border Indiana), the discussion for Northern Lower Michigan, and Eastern Lower Michigan. Here’s the Spyglass Condos Weather Station the S. Haven GLERL station, the Muskegon GLERL station, the Grand Haven Steelheaders webcam and weather station, and the weather station at Holland State Park. Check out the links to webcams. Here’s the infrared satellite loop (night) and the visible satellite loop (daytime), Lake Michigan water temperatures (summer). Here’s recent storm reports from SW Michigan, Northern Michigan, NE Illinois, SE. Wisconsin, Upper Michigan and E. Michigan. Check out the wind and wave height at the South Mid-Lake Michigan Buoy (Apr. to Nov. only), the North Mid-Lake Michigan Buoy (Apr. to Nov. only), the buoy at Big Sable Point near Ludington and the weather station on the beach at St. Joseph. Cool U.S. satellite loop. Here’s the 84-Hour snow forecast from the NAM model and the 120-hour snow forecast from the GFS model and Michigan ski conditions. Here’s a link to ReportIt – where you can send us your pictures, video and storm reports.
Earthquake in Mexico

Posted:Wed, 20 Sep 2017 06:26:06 +0000

A powerful magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck at 2:15 pm Tuesday PM 76 miles southeast of Mexico City near the town of Raboso, about 75 miles southeast of Mexico City. The quake had a depth of 31.7 miles and occurred on the 32nd anniversary of a deadly earthquake that killed approx. 9,500 in the Mexico City area on 9/19/85. At least 44 major buildings collapsed in Mexico City. As I write this, the death toll is 250 and we have to hope it doesn’t reach the 1000’s like it did in 1985. 25 victims were found at an elementary school that collapsed and 20 were still missing there. There have been 34 earthquakes bigger than magnitude-7 within 300 miles of Tuesday’s quake since 1900. Many buildings that did not collapse are probably unsafe to reenter and will have to be demolished. Look at this building swaying.

Video of building collapse…large split in the earth near epicenter…video of building collapse…watch the trees sway in this video. Video shows dust rising from Mexico City due to buildings collapsing…here’s a building collapse…here’s video of the big factory explosion…roads buckled, bridges collapsed….

Crowd cheers as dog pulled from rubble. Ground heaving during the earthquake.

Also magnitude 6.1 e-quake south of New Zealand. We also had a 6.1 magnitude e-quake east of Japan Weds. AM. Magnitude 5.7 quake off Indonesia.
Maria Fri. AM Update

Posted:Tue, 19 Sep 2017 19:00:04 +0000

1:15 am Fri.. –   Maria is now moving to the northwest, away from the Dominican Republic. Peak winds are 125 mph and Maria is now a Category 3 storm. The storm center is ENE of Grand Turk Island and the center will stay over the water as it passes east of the Bahamas. Pretty much the entire island of Puerto Rico is without power. A gust of 113 mph was recorded at the airport in San Juan.   Rivers are flooding in Puerto Rico, but the worst is over for that island. The storm will continue to the northwest then north at 10-12 mph over the next 24 hours. The eye of the storm and the fastest winds will pass northeast of the Turks and Caicos and the eastern Bahamas. They’ll get wind and rain, but not a direct hit. Maria is still likely to mostly or completely miss the U.S., with a period of gusty winds and possibly a little rain from the N. Carolina Outer Banks northward along the mid-Atlantic Coast…nothing significant. One river in Puerto Rico is nearly 20 FEET above it’s previous record flood!

The map above shows the paths of the hurricanes and tropical storms we’ve had this year so far in the Atlantic/Caribbean/Gulf of Mexico. The orange and red colors indicate where hurricanes were the strongest. The map is from Wikipedia and you can go to this link to read about the hurricane season so far. It’s been an active hurricane season in the Atlantic and that trend will continue. For much of the rest of the world 2017 has been a quiet time for tropical storms. As of Weds. evening, Maria is the only hurricane in the world. Jose is a storm transitioning to an extratropical low pressure system and other than that there are only a few small tropical depressions. Here’s a link to the ACE INDEX – a measure of the number and strength of tropical storms. The North Atlantic has been rockin’ this summer/fall – the rest of the world is below average.

Hurricane Maria goes into the record books as one of the top 10 most intense hurricanes ever in the Atlantic.    The storm moved over the island of Dominica Monday evening. One radio transmission from the island said “roofs were flying off and people were calling for help”. Dominica is 290 square miles – roughly half the size of Ottawa County. The population is roughly 72,300 – about the same size as Kalamazoo or Wyoming. Dominica had severe flooding from Tropical Storm Erica two years ago, but the last Category 4 storm to hit the island was David back in 1979. Tweet: “Emergency, roof gone, family in danger.” The eye of the storm than passed over the island of St. Croix Tues. night. Only one Category 5 hurricane on record has made landfall on Puerto Rico – The San Felipe hurricane of 1928 (also destroyed South Florida).

Early Weds. AM, there was only one working weather station on St. Croix. It reported 100-104 mph sustained wind gusting to 137 mph.. Many gusts to 130 mph between 1 am and 2 am EDT. Report of roofs flying off. The roof at the University of the Virgin Islands in St Croix was ripped off. Dropsonde in #Maria‘s eyewall measured surface winds of 168 knots (193 mph). Unprecedented event for St. Croix. Look at the double eyewall of Maria as it passed St. Croix. Historical note: Denmark sold the Virgin Islands to the U.S. for 25 million dollars in gold in 1916. There was a public vote in Denmark and 64.2% voted for the sale.

We still have Tropical Storm Jose (not a hurricane anymore), which has been meandering around in the Atlantic since August. The storm began as a tropical wave off Africa on 8/31. It reached tropical storm status on 9/5 and was named a hurricane on 9/6. The storm threatened the northern Lesser Antilles Islands (Barbuda, Antigua, the Virgin Islands) that were left devastated by Hurricane Irma. However, the storm passed far enough north of the islands to prevent any additional significant wind or flooding. The storm made a complete loop well northeast of the Bahamas and is located off the New England coast. Here’s the Public Advisory and Forecast Discussion on Jose. The storm is giving a rainy, breezy couple of days to Long Island, Nantucket and the Cape Cod Area. It should become an extratropical low pressure system later today (Thu.)

Jose has peak winds 65 mph as I write this, not nearly as powerful as Harvey, Irma or Maria. The storm will drift north past New England and head out to sea.

We had Tropical Depression “Lee”. Lee was far out in the Atlantic and quickly dissipated. This is an example of a storm that may not have been named before we had weather satellites.

Here’s the expected arrival and probability of Tropical Storm Force Winds in the Caribbean Area from Maria. Check these links to the Public Advisory, the Forecast Discussion and the Atlantic Funktop Satellite Loop.  Here’s a radar loop for Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. This link has radar, satellite and current conditions for the Antilles Islands. Here’s radar from Martinique.

This is a graph of air pressure at a buoy near St. Croix. It’s in freefall as the eye approaches and would have gone much lower if the graph would allow. Pressure as low as 26.84″ in the eye overnight.
Rain Along and South of I-94

Posted:Tue, 19 Sep 2017 17:52:05 +0000

The map above is storm total rainfall from late last night and this morning. Once again the significant rain was along and south of I-94. Here’s some rainfall totals: E. Niles 1.39″, Buchanan 0.83″, S. Bend 0.64″, Dowagiac 0.59″ Berrien Springs 0.58″, Scottdale 0.47″, Cassopolis 0.42″, Constantine 0.32″, Kalamazoo (arpt.) 0.31″, Mendon 0.31″, Sturgis 0.25″, Coldwater 0.23″, Kalamazoo (Nature Center) 0.22″, Lawton 0.22″, Oshtemo 0.20″, Decatur 0.18″, Watervliet 0.18″, Lawrence 0.17″, Benton Harbor 0.13″, Ceresco 0.13″, Hartford 0.09″, Plainwell 0.06″, Albion 0.05″, Hastings 0.05″, S. Haven 0.04″, Charlotte 0.01″, Allegan 0.01″. Grand Rapids has not had a drop of rain in 12 days and is now 6 1/2″ below average since June 29.

There is a small chance of a shower or t-storm as a dying trough comes into the area, mainly Weds. night/Thurs. Some areas will likely stay dry for another week. The dry conditions will continue to push along the fall color change and leaf drop. The morning run of the GFS model gives G.R. highs of 85 to 90 each day from Weds. thru Tuesday of next week. It’ll be a very warm Football Frenzy Friday night and it’ll be hot for the college games on Sat.
Devastation on Dominica

Posted:Tue, 19 Sep 2017 03:50:43 +0000

The pic. above is a satellite view showing the eye of Hurricane Maria passing directly over the island of Dominica Monday night. Read the facebook posts of the Prime Minister, Roosevelt Skerrit: “My roof is gone. I am at the complete mercy of the hurricane. House is flooding.” “The winds are merciless! We shall survive by the grace of God!” “We not dare look out. All we are hearing is the sound of galvanize flying. The sound of the fury of the wind. As we pray for its end!”

Other tweets are even more tragic: “The hospital roof is gone and the generator has failed”. “The radio station has lost its roof”. “Roofs being blown off. People calling for help.” “Reports I am hearing from #Dominica are just terrifying.” “Please tell the world that #Dominica has been devastated. In the morning we’ll know how many dead there are.” “We lost the roof. My total upstairs, the ceiling and everything collapsed. I have two inches of water downstairs.My god, I can only feel the pain of those who don’t have the house that I have. It was terrible and I just hope people didn’t die.” “Prime Minister confirms ‘total devastation’ on the island.” “Eastern Coast is decimated” “My island is being battered… prayers solicited if you are a praying person… ”

Aircraft dropsonde measured 183 mph winds at 1500 feet in the NW eyewall. There are many elevated areas in Dominica over 1500 feet. Message from the Prime Minister of Dominica. Here’s Maria’s fury on the island of St. Kitts.

The island of Dominica is 28.5 square miles, roughly half the size of Ottawa County. The population is approx. 72,300, roughly the same as Kalamazoo or Wyoming, Michigan. Mountains rise to 4,747 feet above sea level in the center of the island. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the higher hills caught a gust that approached 200 mph. I expect the same level of damage on the island as Irma produced in Barbuda and the Virgin Islands. Rivers were flooding even before the heaviest rain arrived. “The Roseau River (main river in capital) has flooded the streets of the capital, bursting through residents’ doors.”

Maria remains a category 5 storm Tue. PM and is expected to head over Puerto Rico, where significant to severe damage from wind and flooding is likely, then just to the east of the Turks and Caicos and the Bahama Islands. Maria is expected to miss the contiguous U.S. as it turns more north then northeast and heads for the middle of the Atlantic. Nice map here showing the paths of Irma, Jose and Maria.

Here’s waves on the edge of Maria in Barbados. This was flooding from Tropical Storm Erica two years ago.
Sunday was Warmer than Any Day in August!

Posted:Mon, 18 Sep 2017 03:03:42 +0000

These are high temperatures from Sunday afternoon. Both the 89 in G.R. and the 91 in Kalamazoo were warmer than any high temperature in the month of August! To find consecutive days warmer than the 88 in G.R. on Sat. and the 89 on Sun., you have to go back to the 2nd week of June. Grand Rapids has had 5 days of 90-degrees this summer and Kalamazoo has had 8. We may not be done with 90 yet, as we have more hot weather coming later this week.

These are high temperatures across the Midwest and Great Lakes. You can see cooler air to our west and northwest. Normally, a cool front would produce west or northwest wind that would bring in that cooler air. However, the wind will be northeast on Monday and while it’ll be 5-10 degrees cooler than Sunday (in inland areas…it’ll be the same at Lake Michigan), we’ll still be well above our average high in the low 70s. The warmest temp. in the U.S. on Sunday was 107 at Death Valley CA and the coolest was 21 at Daniel WY.

The days continue to shorten at the rate of about 3 min. per day or 20 min. per week. The sunrise in downtown G.R. on Monday is at 7:26 am and the sunset at 7:47 pm. We’ve lost three hours of daylight since the Summer Solstice back on June 21.

Also…Lightning hit the Wind Wand in New Plymouth, New Zealand. The Wind Wand is a 157-foot high “sculpture” that features a lighted red fiberglass tube with a lighted ball on top. The Wand stands straight up and down when the wind is calm, but bends when the wind is blowing. The red sphere on the top contains 1,296 light-emitting diodes. The lightning blew a fuse. Thunderstorms produced 3,000 lightning strikes in New Zealand. A total of 226 customers lost power. That has since been restored. (pic. from Wikipedia).

And…Winter Storm Watch for The Cascade Mts. for 2-6″ of snow above 5,000 ft. elevation. Six percent of Miami-Dade Co. is still without power late Sun. night. Waterspout – Sabine Pass TX. Good news from Patrick DeHaan (our GasBuddy): BY FAR! The biggest weekly drops in #gasprices have been in #Indiana & #Michigan. Average prices have fallen 19c & 17c, respectively. 11% of gas stations in FL and 10% in GA still do not have gas. Pretty sunset. Snow in the mountains of Montana.

Here’s radar from Martinique showing hurricane “Maria”. Maria is headed toward the islands of Dominica and Guadeloupe, which is an island shaped like a butterfly. There is a bay on the east side of the island that could get a big storm surge. As I write this, Maria is a Category 3 with 120 mph winds.

Eight people were killed in violet storms in Romania on Sunday. Flash flooding in Laos.