Blue Canyon, CA, 1917.
Mount Rainier, WA, 1917
North Dakota, 1966
No date or location given.
Manhattan, NYC, NY in the late 1960's
Posted on 01/05/2005 8:29:29 AM PST by 1LongTimeLurker
WASHINGTON — Moisture-laden storms from the north, west and south are likely to converge on much of America over the next several days in what could be a once-in-a-generation onslaught, meteorologists forecast yesterday.
If the gloomy computer models at the U.S. Climate Prediction Center are right, we'll see this terrible trio:
• The "Pineapple Express," a series of warm, wet storms heading east from Hawaii, drenching Southern California and the far Southwest, already beset with heavy rain and snow. Flooding, avalanches and mudslides are possible.
• An "Arctic Express," a mass of cold air chugging south from Alaska and Canada, bringing frigid air and potentially heavy snow and ice to the usually mild-wintered Pacific Northwest.
• An unnamed warm, moist storm system from the Gulf of Mexico drenching the already-saturated Ohio, Tennessee and Mississippi valleys. Expect heavy river flooding and springlike tornadoes.
Meteorologists caution that their predictions are only as good as their computer models. And forecasts are less accurate the further into the future they attempt to predict. "The models tend to overdo the formation of these really exciting weather formations for us," said Mike Wallace, a University of Washington atmospheric scientist.
Yet the more Wallace studied the models, the more he became convinced that something wicked was coming this way.
"It all fits together nicely," he said. "There's going to be weather in the headlines this weekend, that's for sure."
The National Weather Service yesterday issued a statement warning that several inches of snow could fall by the end of the weekend in the central Puget Sound lowlands, including Seattle. The snow could begin as soon as tomorrow night, particularly in areas north of Seattle, with a growing chance of snow farther south Friday, the weather service said. Highs through this weekend are expected to be in the low- to mid-30s, with lows in the mid- to high-20s.
"Don't sound the alarm," weather service meteorologist Johnny Burg said. "But tell everybody to just pay attention to future forecasts."
The three storms are likely to meet in the nation's midsection and cause even more problems, sparing only areas east of the Appalachian Mountains. Property damage and a few deaths are likely, forecasters said.
"You're talking a two- or three-times-a-century type of thing," said prediction-center senior meteorologist James Wagner, who has been forecasting storms since 1965. "It's a pattern that has a little bit of everything."
The exact time and place of the predicted 1-2-3 punch changes slightly with every new forecast. But the National Weather Service, in its weekly "hazards assessment," alerted meteorologists and disaster specialists yesterday that flooding and frigid weather could start as early as Friday and stretch into early next week, if not longer.
"It's a situation that looks pretty potent," said Ed O'Lenic, the Climate Prediction Center's operations chief. "A large part of North America looks like it's going to be affected."
Kelly Redmond, deputy director of the Western Regional Climate Center at the Desert Research Institute in Reno, Nev., where an unusual 18 inches of snow is on the ground, said the expected heavy Western rains could cause avalanches. Southern California and western Arizona have had three to four times the normal precipitation for the area since Oct. 1.
"Somebody is in for something pretty darn interesting," Redmond said.
Somebody already knows.
A wintry blast yesterday closed schools and glazed roads with ice and snow in the Rockies and on the central Plains, a 40-mile stretch of Interstate 5 was closed north of Los Angeles after up to 3 feet of snow fell in the region, and new flooding hit northeast of Phoenix, killing one man and leaving another missing.
Various levels of winter-weather advisories and storm warnings were in effect into this morning from Arizona to Connecticut, the weather service said.
Up to 2 feet of snow was possible in Colorado, where one traffic fatality was blamed on the weather and an avalanche blocked U.S. 550 about 40 miles north of Durango, the weather service said.
The last time a similar situation seemed to be brewing — especially in the West — was in January 1950, O'Lenic said. Seattle received 21 inches of snow, killing 13 people in an extended freeze, and Sunnyvale, Calif., was the scene of an unusual tornado.
The same scenario played out in 1937, when there was record flooding in the Ohio River Valley, said Wagner, of the prediction center.
He was worried about the Ohio and Tennessee River valleys as the places where the three nasty storm systems could meet, probably with snow, thunderstorms, severe ice storms and flooding. Some of those areas already are flooded.
The converging storms are being steered by high-pressure ridges off Alaska and Florida and are part of a temporary change in world climate conditions, O'Lenic said.
Over equatorial Indonesia, east of where a tsunami hit Dec. 26, meteorologists have identified a weather-making phenomenon called the Madden-Julian Oscillation. It's producing extra-stormy weather to its east. Similar oscillations in the north Atlantic and north Pacific are changing global weather patterns. Add this year's mild El Niño — a warming of the equatorial Pacific — which is unusually far west, Redmond said.
Seattle Times staff reporter Warren King contributed to this report; yesterday's weather was reported by The Associated Press
What do you expect from a state that elected Howard Dean its governor? [snicker]
That has to be very close to the top of my list of the most idiotic movies I've ever seen. Just dumber than a box of rocks.
You win!
Agreed...if global warming is happening, I'm all in favor of it. I'd recommend everyone read Michael Crichton's new State of Fear; a great novel which incorporates all the views I've had on global warming for years, and more. Great book.
Gasp! You make coats out of your terriers!?!
Women and minorities hardest hit.
Don't forget about the children, it's all about the children.
Oh man, I agree 100 percent. It was billed as being based on scientific fact....the only science that jumble of environazi rhetoric was based on is the environmental report ordered by the Clinton administration; the one that claimed global warming is responsible for everything from precipitation to car jackings and was officially rebutted as complete bunk by a group of highly respected scientists who traveled all the way to DC to protest it.
Blue Canyon, CA, 1917.
Mount Rainier, WA, 1917
North Dakota, 1966
No date or location given.
Manhattan, NYC, NY in the late 1960's
The hardwoods are so void in the region! I guess it was all logged out in the 1800's and it was found too rocky and infertile for farmland.
Actually, the movie was based on a book by Whitley Streiber and Art Bell, which, in turn, was based on Bell's notion that events in the world are "quickening." Bell even wrote a book (less successful than Day After Tomorrow) and titled it "The Quickening." It's all the new age crackpot nonsense rolled into one goofy mess of a story.
Nobody mentioned an Alberta Clipper, we had a good one in '78. Dropped 27 inches of snow on northern Indiana and we were snowed in for 5 days...Had a good time, do it again in a minute...
LOL...what part of PA are you in Crumb? I am east of Pittsburgh (Irwin) and it is just the usual rainy, dreary WPA winter day. It looks like the nasty stuff will stay north of here...Good luck to you...and don't forget toilet paper. If possible, drive, in a panic, of course, to the nearest supermarket (Giant Iggle if you are in the western part of the state)...purchase as much TP, milk and bread as your buggy will hold. Now you are ready for the storm!
ART BELL?!?! You're kidding! I was told several times by different people that everything in the movie was based on "scientific fact", which led me to assume the nutball theories outlined must derive from Algore's report. And yet that movie, combined with the convenient (for the left) tsunamis are helping to generate paranoid global warmingcooling theories behind all of these "environmental catastrophe" stories in the news
I'm about a mile from the NY State border.
Art Bell and Whitley Streiber wrote "The Coming Global Superstorm," on which the movie was based. On Streiber's website, the description of "Superstorm" is "The book that inspired the Day After Tomorrow! Now with a new afterword by Whitley and Art." Bell and Streiber had been hawking "Superstorm" for at least a couple of years before the movie was made.
Then Streiber wrote a book titled "The Day After Tomorrow," which is based on the movie -- to take advantage, in book sales, of the movie sales. The description on his website for this tome is "First, Whitley and Art wrote the book that inspired the movie. Now Whitley's written the book inspired BY the movie!"
The only thing scientific about any of this is the following formula:
Gullible people + smooth-talking con artists with new age radio show + Hollywood Leftists who saw an opportunity to not-so-subtly bash GWB and Dick Cheney before the 2004 election = pathetic, but money-making movie .
There's a sucker born every minute. Made Scientology a success, why not this stupid movie?
"In 1999 a major climatological study predicted that the Earth will soon be warmer than it has been in millions of years."
That would be the Clinton administration, made to order study detailing how every event on the globe is connectable to global warming.
From this site, with an overview of The Coming Global Superstorm The book is Bell and Streiber's crop circle method of rebutting the report with their climatological, rubber band theory.
Not that it matters that both of us are right...the whole thing is still nothing but a snake oil sale.
The problem centers around the one decent snow every 4 years. Most people don't even own a car longer than 4 years. So many people, myself included, do not buy separate rims with Michelin Artic Alpins. We just tough it out.
I've been driving for 20 years and have never been in an accident. Although I've been stuck a couple of times.
The city can grind to a halt, but it's not the fault of bad driving.
Alarmist - yes. Potential - yes. CA is already fairly saturated from a couple of weeks of general rain. I also have first hand experience when moist tropical air overides arctic air - lots of white stuff. Best case is for Rockies which need excessive moisture to overcome drought conditions. Bringing my umbrella to work just the same. ;)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.