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As every schoolchild knows, water freezes at 0oC. Or perhaps not. It has been known for centuries that pure water, in the absence of any nucleating surface, can remain in a supercooled liquid state down to temperatures as low as -40oC. Now, researchers in Israel have discovered that supercooled water itself will freeze at different temperatures depending on whether it is in contact with a positively or negatively charged surface.  Ice crystals © Thinkstock Images For more than 150 years it has been known that electrical fields can affect the freezing point of supercooled water. However, it has been difficult to study...

Get ready for a busy couple of weeks as a full return of winter is on its WAAY. If you remember in the Winter Outlook that was presented in October, I mentioned a cold winter was expected for much of the Eastern U.S. and that February would likely be the coldest. We had a period of significant chill in January with a period of a thaw but now the next two weeks is going to give early January’s cold a run for its money. Cold will again make its way all the way out of the Arctic and into the...

A federal immigration judge will decide Thursday whether President Obama's aunt, who has been in the United States illegally for years, will be allowed to stay. Zeituni Onyango, 57, applied for political asylum in 2002, citing violence in her native Kenya. She is the half-sister of the president's late father.

In my last post I commented on how the possibility existed for a near repeat performance for portions of the Southeast with more wintry precipitation late this week into the start of the weekend. Well, I am not as convinced anymore and it appears a double-barreled low will set up with one heading up from the Gulf Coast into the Ohio Valley while another will spin up off the northeastern Florida coast and head northward.

Attention will then turn to the Southwestern U.S. where another storm system will move ashore associated with the subtropical jetstream. This system will spread more rains and mountain snows to the western U.S. from Canada into the desert Southwest on Tuesday and Wednesday. This upper level energy will begin to aid in the development of a surface storm system northeastern “Old” Mexico by Thursday morning. In its advance, a southerly flow will set up and produce a solid fetch of Gulf moisture that will encompass much of the Gulf coast from Texas to Florida by Thursday morning.

Had a chance to quickly look at a couple new models lat this evening and the trend appears to be heading a bit further south with the main system and a bit colder , too. So what does this all mean? Well, during the past day or so the trend had been moving a bit further north with the low moving out of Louisiana to near the I-20 corridor in Alabama and then eastward into Georgia. That meant the likelihood that it would try to remain mainly rain from northern Mississippi into northern Alabama and Georgia during the heaviest precipitation....

***Added a comment based on a look at the new BAMS 3KM Model run see below in (*)*** Confidence is on the high side that a major snow event is ready to take place from the Panhandles of Texas to Virginia. A wide swath of 6 to 12 inches will be expected with some spots may see up to 18 inches. The heaviest is expected across the Panhandles of Texas/Oklahoma, northern Arkansas/southern Missouri and the mountains of Virginia/North Carolina and southeastern Kentucky. Still have questions has to how far south icing problems will be a concern. Could it make it...

This is a very complicated and difficult winter storm forecast for the Tennessee Valley and a lot can still change. Confidence is definitely increasing for a major winter storm for much of the I-40 corridor from New Mexico-Amarillo-Oklahoma City-Little Rock-Memphis-Nashville Thursday through Friday. If you are planning travel in these locations please be aware of the potential travel hazards that could greet you.

It is looking ever more likely that a major winter storm pact with snow and ice is going to take place along the I-40 corridor from New Mexico to Tennessee, through Friday. There are still some questions

A potential major winter storm with snow and ice is eying portions of the southern U.S. later this week. Question is exactly where. To help give you an idea of at least where the potential lies and the reason questions linger, I have provide a video blog post. Enjoy!

GAINESVILLE, Mo. -- Its a hot button issue in the Ozarks and nation. Illegal immigration has some asking, 'is enough being done.' U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E.) was created under the Department of Homeland Security to ensure our nation's safety. KY3 found answering the simple question of 'who can be arrested?' is complicated. "Imagine my head hurting," Ozark County Sheriff Raymond Pace said. "I had five right off the border, still had pesos, looking for a Bank of America to cash in their pesos and get American dollars." Sheriff Pace brought undocumented immigrants to his office and called I.C.E....

According to the Rutgers University Global Snow Lab, last month had the second greatest December Northern Hemisphere snow cover since records were started in 1966. Snow extent was measured at 45.86 million sq. km, topped only by 1985 at 45.99 million sq. km. North America set a record December extent at 15.98 million sq. km, and the US also set a December record at 4.16 million sq. km. A favorite mantra of the global warming community is that reduced snow cover will reduce the albedo of the earth and provide positive feedback to global warming – causing additional warming. Clearly...

A recently introduced immigration reform bill in the U.S. House of Representatives could potentially end a federal immigration program currently used by the Town of Herndon to empower its local officers to enforce federal immigration law. In March 2007, the Herndon Town Council voted to make Herndon the first incorporated town in America to allow U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to train and empower local officers to enforce federal immigration law under a program called 287(g). Prince William and Loudoun counties and the cities of Manassas and Manassas Park also partner with ICE in the 287(g) program. But as of...

Snow covers Britain from head to toe As if dusted with icing sugar, this satellite image of Britain shows the full extent of the snow coverage affecting the country. From head to toe there is barely a patch of land not blanketed by the heaviest snowfall in 50 years. It was taken at 11.15am on Thursday by the NASA satellite Terra and transmitted to the University of Dundee Satellite Receiving Station.

Footage released by the CIA shows a man conducting a clandestine arms deal in a Tbilisi, Georgia hotel, allegedly procuring parts of weapons and other military systems for use in Iran. Unbeknownst to the man, the dealers he was talking to were in fact undercover Philadelphia-based US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. According to an analyst for Channel 2, which aired the footage Sunday evening, the fake transaction in the hotel, which ended in the man's arrest, may be a modus operandi of the Iranian regime, and there is no telling how many similar transactions the Iranians conclude successfully.

More than six months after government officials seized his rare vintage military aircraft, Claude Hendrickson said he is still in the dark about why the airplane was confiscated and when and if it will be returned to him. Until the 1952 airplane -- believed to be one of only a handful of Douglas AD-4N Skyraiders in the U.S. -- is released from federal custody, Hendrickson said the aircraft will slowly deteriorate because he can't maintain it. ---- Virginia Dabbs, spokeswoman for Customs and Border Patrol, said she could not comment on Hendrickson's claims. "We don't harass people," Dabbs said.

Last night, the models were all in pretty good agreement with taking this storm system from north-central Texas up through western Missouri and then into Minnesota which lead me in the direction of providing you the information in the latest post. Things may be on the change again. Not a huge surprise to me, though. As I had previously mentioned until the storm system really moves into the U.S. the upper air data would not be that great and that would influence the model outputs.

It is appearing more likely that the heaviest snow, in excess of 6” and as much as 2 feet, will be falling Wednesday through Christmas Day from the Panhandles of Texas/Oklahoma to Wisconsin. Some cities that will be affected includes:

How Will It Impact Your Travel? Still watching the likely development of a BIG winter storm from the Southwestern US to the Heartland but details are still sketchy. To explain why I say this, I chose to provide you with another video blog post. I hope it helps clear some fuzziness up.

Still a lot of questions for the upcoming holiday week storm but things are becoming a bit clearer. However, I won't be comfortable nailing this one down until the storm moves on shore in the Pacific NW over the next day or two so the models have better initial data to use. I explain the very latest in today's video blog entry. Enjoy!

Are you “Dreaming of a White Christmas”? Many of us each year dream of a white Christmas but we know it is just going to be a dream unless we head to the mountains or someplace else where we know snow will be. This year, though, many of us who normally have to just hold on to a dream of a white Christmas may actually get what we dream for as a present from Mother Nature. As I hinted to last week, the weather pattern setting up for Christmas week appears generally to be cold. Specifics were up in question...

There are many kinds of truth. Al Gore was poleaxed by an inconvenient one yesterday. The former US Vice-President, who became an unlikely figurehead for the green movement after narrating the Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth, became entangled in a new climate change “spin” row. Mr Gore, speaking at the Copenhagen climate change summit, stated the latest research showed that the Arctic could be completely ice-free in five years. In his speech, Mr Gore told the conference: “These figures are fresh. Some of the models suggest to Dr [Wieslav] Maslowski that there is a 75 per cent chance that the...

Sunday, December 13, 2009Vigil held remembering ICE sweep that ended in 260 arrests in Greeley Swift raid continues to resonate with many By Colin LindenmayerThe Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid on Greeley's Swift & Co. plant three years ago is still causing deep impacts on Ernesto Garcia's life. Garcia, who was arrested during the raid, initially spent four months behind bars. Although he's been released, his court date from the raid has been pushed back until January 2011. Garcia can't legally work in the United States until after the hearing. “It was a nightmare for me,” Garcia said through a...

While the wizards of smart are convening in Copenhagen, attempting to solve what they perceive to be the biggest global societal ill - anthropogenic climate change, one of the things that likely won't be discussed is the possibility of the opposite occurring, global cooling. But AccuWeather's chief hurricane forecaster, Joe Bastardi warns it is a bigger threat than global warming. He says the phenomenon is coming, based on three priniciple reasons - 1) Natural reversal of ocean cycles, 2) Low sun spot activity and 3) An increase in volcanic and seismic activity. Bastardi made this case on the Fox Business...

J. Storrs Hall writes: One thing that Climategate does is give us an opportunity to step back from the details of the AGW argument and say, maybe these are heat-of-the-moment stuff, and in the long run will look as silly as the Durants’ allergy to Eisenhower. And perhaps, if we can put climate arguments in perspective, it will allow us to put the much smaller nano arguments (pun intended) into perspective too. So let’s look at some ice. I’m looking at the temperature record as read from this central Greenland ice core. It gives us about as close as we...

Updates in the BARNETT v OBAMA case in Judge Carter's court: Request for investigation of misconduct in legal proceedings, submission of perjured affidavits, submission of a letter to court by an attorney with improper purpose of covering up criminal activity and obstruction of justice, withholding evidence by attorneys, and US attorneys acting under conflict of interest From 11.11.09. to 11.22.09. I had the honor to be a delegate at the Continental Congress 2009. One of the guest speakers for the Continental Congress was a former Immigration officer and currently a private investigator in CO, Mr. John Samson. I have stated...

I hold an executive position at a private corporation located on Long Island, NY (250+ employees). On Thursday, November 19, 2009, two casually dressed gentlemen showed up at our facility (unannounced) and asked for the Human Resource Manager.They, unilaterally, determined that our company had a connection to the public safety and national security concerns of the United States. As such, they are requiring us to provide them with 100% of the Form I-9 - Employment Eligibility Verifications for all our current employees and employees who have been terminated within the past 12 months.The purpose of the form is for an...

More than 1,000 illegal immigrants awaiting trial for serious crimes in one major U.S. county were instead deported by federal immigration authorities and freed in their home countries. The released offenders include at least 128 murderers, more than 400 child rapists and molesters, some 300 charged with aggravated assault and dozens more accused of sexual assault, aggravated robbery, kidnapping and other grave felonies. The offenders’ newfound freedom came courtesy of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the federal agency that provided a one-way ticket home after bail was posted in their state criminal case. This sort of voluntary deportation to...

File under: Very Curious Event A London-based official at ICE said that the exchange is cancelling trades on dollar index futures above 76.50, after a spike in the contact that saw it jump to 82.18. The official said they are still investigating the cause for the move. Recent trades showed the contract up 0.7% to 75.89.

U.S. immigration officials put an unprecedented 1,000 businesses — including 42 in the Houston metro area — on notice Thursday that their paperwork would be inspected to make sure they don't employ illegal immigrants. The announcement marks the largest round of immigration-related business audits ever, and the latest in an ongoing Department of Home­land Security campaign to create a “culture of compliance” with immigration law among employers, Immigration and Customs Enforcement Assistant Secretary John Morton said Thursday. The audits will target businesses ICE has identified as being associated with the nation's “critical infrastructure,” which includes some industries key to...

MORE than 100 penguin-loving tourists including dozens from Britain are trapped by ice off Antarctica aboard a Russian ice-breaker cruise ship... The Kapitan Khlebnikov is in a bay near Snow Hill island, located off the northeastern end of the Antarctic Peninsula, and cannot leave as the bay is sealed off with ice... Everything is calm aboard the ice-breaker, nothing is threatening the passengers and crew... There were 105 passengers aboard the vessel ...The ship has been at its current location for four days. "To put it plainly, the ship got stuck between an island and an ice massif.''

A project to encase one of Detroit's thousands of abandoned homes in ice this winter to draw attention to foreclosures that have battered the region is moving forward and expanding. Photographer Gregory Holm said this week that the state's land bank agreed to donate a home on the city's east side for the Ice House Detroit project. The scope of the project by Holm and freelance architect Matthew Radune is growing. They plan to use some money they've raised to help a Detroit family get a home by paying back taxes on a foreclosure. Holm also said early-release prisoners will...

Note: The following text is a quote: November 6, 2009 U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and World Customs Organization Secretary General Kunio Mikuriya announce preliminary results of largest global cash smuggling operation BRUSSELS - Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano and World Customs Organization (WCO) Secretary General Kunio Mikuriya today announced the preliminary results of Operation ATLAS-the largest multilateral operation in history targeting cash smugglers which took place from Oct. 26-30. More than 80 countries participated in Operation ATLAS (an acronym for Assess, Target, Link, Analyze and Share)-leading to more than $3.5 million in cash seized and...

CHICAGO - The Federal Aviation Administration said it is investigating the origin of a falling ice chunk that damaged the roof and gutters of a Chicago home. The FAA said it is looking into whether any of the planes approaching O'Hare International Airport, which is located about 10 miles from the home, Wednesday night had water leakage problems, the Chicago Tribune reported Thursday. Homeowner Paul Dowd said the large ice chunk hit the roof of the house at about 7:52 p.m. He said a police report was filed and he contacted his insurance company. The home is under a flight...

New York Daily News SNIPPET: "NEW YORK — El Salvadoran leaders of the MS-13 gang allegedly put out a contract on the federal agent responsible for a crackdown on its New York factions, the Daily News has learned. The brazen plot to assassinate the unidentified Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent was revealed in an arrest warrant for reputed gang member Walter (Duke) Torres. Torres tipped authorities to the plan after he and four other MS-13 members were stopped by NYPD detectives for hassling passersby on Northern Blvd. in Queens last month."

El Salvadoran leaders of the MS-13 gang allegedly put out a contract on the federal agent responsible for a crackdown on its New York factions, the Daily News has learned. The brazen plot to assassinate the unidentified Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent was revealed in an arrest warrant for reputed gang member Walter (Duke) Torres. Torres tipped authorities to the plan after he and four other MS-13 members were stopped by NYPD detectives for hassling passersby on Northern Blvd. in Queens last month. He told cops he had information to pass on, and was debriefed Oct. 22 at Rikers Island,...

The multiyear ice covering the Arctic Ocean has effectively vanished, a startling development that will make it easier to open up polar shipping routes, an Arctic expert said on Thursday. Vast sheets of impenetrable multiyear ice, which can reach up to 80 meters (260 feet) thick, have for centuries blocked the path of ships seeking a quick short cut through the fabled Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. They also ruled out the idea of sailing across the top of the world. But David Barber, Canada's Research Chair in Arctic System Science at the University of Manitoba, said...

Note: The following text is a quote: Secretary Napolitano Announces Transfer of Federal Protective Service to National Protection and Programs Directorate Release Date: October 29, 2009 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano today announced the transfer of the Federal Protective Service (FPS) from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to the National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD)—streamlining decision-making and aligning the protection of federal buildings with DHS’ broader critical infrastructure protection mission. “Securing government facilities is a vital aspect of DHS’ critical infrastructure protection mission,” said Secretary Napolitano. “Transferring FPS to NPPD will enhance oversight and efficiency while...

In 2003, several counties in Northern Virginia banded together to form a joint task force to crack down on illegals and gangs. Then in March of last year, Prince William County made national headlines by upping the ante even further. They passed an ordinance that required County police to verify the immigration status of any criminal or traffic suspects when there was probable cause to think they were in the country illegally. The suspects were held and transferred to ICE, irrespective of the disposition of the underlying charge.

First, not totally exactly geology, but one of the more amazing iceberg pictures I've ever seen: Next, an offering from Patrick Smith Photography (I had one of these before): this one won some awards and was on the cover of a photography magazine: Finally, Marion Island from space: click for full-size

At 8 a.m. Sunday the population of Kinsman, Ill., stood at 109. An hour later it nearly doubled, as upwards of 100 federal agents and police swooped in on the tiny, rural community. And no one seems to know why. The law enforcement officers, including FBI agents, immigration officials and state police, surrounded an Islamic meat plant in Kinsman, cordoning off the area and briefly detaining the plant's handful of employees. The FBI isn't saying much, and the county sheriff is mum too, leaving Kinsman's residents mystified. The bust, in a town that has no local police force, involved dozens...

A simple ... search of Michal Preclik's name turns up an Interpol wanted poster from his native Czech Republic. So where was he arrested? In Nebraska's maximum-security prison, where he was not an inmate, but a guard. Preclik had worked at the prison for a year and his arrest came just two months after officials at Tecumseh State Correctional Institution promoted the 32-year-old to corporal. Prison officials learned last month that he was wanted on suspicion of drug and fraud crimes. "This is just unbelievable that the state of Nebraska is hiring international criminals," said state Sen. Heath Mello of...

3:59 p.m.: We're about 15 minutes from kickoff here at Gillette Stadium, and the grounds crew is shoveling snow off of the field. It's been snowing pretty hard here for about an hour.

Organizers of a vigil against the mistreatment of federal detainees called for the closure of the nation's largest immigration detention center known as “Tent City” in Raymondville. The vigil was held by some one hundred people from across Texas Friday evening. The privately-operated prison in Willacy County houses some 3,000 immigrants. Some of them have turned to Action 4 News to sound off on allegations of horrendous conditions, sexual assaults, rotten food and poor medical care inside the facility. Vigil organizers, some from as far away as Austin and Laredo, said the inhumane treatment of detainees must be stopped. “We...

Those who ignore the geologic perspective do so at great risk. In fall of 1985, geologists warned that a Columbian volcano, Nevado del Ruiz, was getting ready to erupt. But the volcano had been dormant for 150 years. So government officials and inhabitants of nearby towns did not take the warnings seriously. On the evening of November 13, Nevado del Ruiz erupted, triggering catastrophic mudslides. In the town of Armero, 23,000 people were buried alive in a matter of seconds... For ninety percent of the last million years, the normal state of the Earth's climate has been an ice age....

Calling himself “the poster boy” for those who oppose the enforcement of federal immigration laws, Sheriff Joe Arpaio said he will continue to arrest individuals who are in the country illegally, even if Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) does not renew the 287(g) agreement that the Maricopa County (Ariz.) Sheriff’s Office has operated under for the past two years. “We’ve been doing it for two years and have been very successful, but I guess they don’t like to enforce illegal immigration laws,” Arpaio told CNSNews.com. “[It] doesn’t make any difference. I’m still going to continue my programs, regardless of what...

DebbieSchlussel.com has learned that Robert Schoch, the Special Agent in Charge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for Los Angeles, is under investigation for alleged embezzlement and/or misuse of ICE funds used in undercover operations. Mr. Schoch and the Los Angeles Deputy Special Agent in charge, Jennifer Silliman, were escorted from the ICE federal offices in Long Beach, California, and had their badges and guns taken from them (standard procedure when an agent is under investigation and put on leave). They were both put on administrative leave pending a continuing investigation. A search warrant was reportedly executed on Agent Schoch’s...

(CNSNews.com) – The Congressional Hispanic Caucus has asked the Obama administration to “immediately terminate” a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) program that has identified more than 120,000 illegal aliens over the past three years.. “On behalf of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC), we write to ask that you immediately terminate all Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Memorandums of Understanding (MOUs) under the 287(g) program and cease to establish such agreements,” reads the letter to President Obama. “These agreements are the subject of serious concern as local law enforcement agencies have used the new powers to target communities of color,...

Agents arrested nine men Thursday following a nine-month investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that targeted the "Barrio Evil 13" street gang, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Agents served search warrants at homes in Bell Gardens and Los Angeles, and at a Bell Gardens warehouse used by the gang to store illegal weapons, according to ICE. During the searches, agents recovered dozens of high-powered weapons, including assault rifles, handguns, silencers, a shotgun and thousands of rounds of ammunition, ICE reported. Among the suspects was Henry "Silent" Valenzuela, 27, of Bell Gardens, who allegedly told an ICE undercover investigator...

This year's cooler-than-expected summer means the Arctic probably won't experience ice-free summers until 2030 or 2040, scientists say. Some models had previously predicted that the Arctic could be ice free in summer by as soon as 2013, due to rising temperatures from global warming. However, that scenario required Arctic sea ice to shrink at the record-setting pace of summer 2007, when sea ice coverage dropped to 1.6 million square miles (4.13 million square kilometers), said Walter Meier, a scientist at the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado. This summer Arctic sea ice shrank to only 1.97...