FloydFreak's Blog

Here's another question for the Fox 13 meteorologists...

Why do all of the local meteorologists - as well as the NWS - refer to the sea breeze boundary (or front) as just "the sea breeze"? The expression involves the formation of thunderstorms "along the sea breeze".

I liken this to saying that something is located "along the Gulf of Mexico" as opposed to saying "along the Gulf COAST". In other words, the sea breeze in and of itself is an air mass (just as the Gulf is a water mass) whereas the boundary between the sea breeze and the prevailing winds (whatever they are) is a line, as is a coastline.

Perhaps I am nitpicking, but it's one of those little things that bugs me.

Perhaps the rainy season is starting to kick in after all. We have had over four inches of rain this past week here in Alachua. But last night's storm was one for the books...

Yesterday started off warm and partly cloudy with the usual smattering of cumulus clouds. However, all through the afternoon, none of them exhibited any kind of vertical development to speak of. But around 7:00-7:30, it began to rain heavily just to our east and we could see that it appeared to be not so much moving toward us but developing toward us. The rain started lightly at first but, shortly after I put chicken breasts on the gas grill, the lightning started coming fast and furious.

Before I knew it, the NWS had issued a "significant weather alert" for our area for excessive lightning. After it let up, I went out to check the rain gauge. Just about 8/10's of an inch had fallen in about forty minutes.

The next thing I knew, the lightning came back and it was raining harder than ever. This prompted a severe thunderstorm warning for us. Although we had no significant wind gusts nor hail, we received an additional inch-and-a-half of rainfall. It did not let up until after 10:00pm.

I cannot remember a summertime thunderstorm lasting this long. It was simply unreal. But the rain was welcomed - even if the cooked chicken breasts did get wet.

Sixty percent rain chance today - fingers are crossed.

Last year, we couldn't BUY a drop of rain and we were choking on smoke from rampant forest fires in neighboring counties. The drought was worse up here in North Florida than it was in the Bay Area (although we were kind enough to share our smoke with Bay Area residents).

This year, we have been blessed by a reasonably (if not terribly) wet late-winter/early-spring. and I DO mean BLESSED. The only thing worse than watching your landscaping get parched in the relentless heat is watching forest fires burn and seeing your rivers, streams, and ponds dry up.

Now we have swapped the smoke for mosquitoes. In five years of living in Alachua County, the mosquitoes are the worst that I have seen them. But it is a small price to pay. Hey, that's what Cutter is for.

Here's another side benefit of the rain...go to Publix and get yourself some fresh corn. It is the BEST that I've tasted in years. I'm no expert but I'd be willing to bet money that the rain is at least part of the reason why the corn is so good.

Well, we're not out of the woods yet; we probably never will be.

But last Friday's soaking rain was just what the doctor ordered. I long ago misplaced the rain gauge - I haven't needed it - so I do not know exactly how much rain we got Friday but I'm guessing (along with NWS radar images) four inches. Friday's rain combined with the other series of storms that we've had since the first of the year have helped to ease the drought in northern Florida.

My wife and I have a small pond on our property (probably 50 x 120 feet) that I was afraid was going to dry up. It had been on a steady downward trend since the hurricanes of 2004 (when it nearly breached). It is at the highest level that I've seen it in a good two years. We have two river birch trees that we planted near the pond a year ago. At that time, they were high and dry. Now they're in water and I'm going to have to transplant them. Also, there is a small creek not far from my house that has water in it again.

But it certainly is refreshing to see it actually raining again. Now, all we can do is hope for a nice wet summer rainy season (no hurricanes, please).

A meteorologist, Paul
Certainly gave it his all.
He said with a smirk:
"Do you think this is work?”
It looks like he’s having a ball.

A weather guy we know as Andy
With weather charts, boy was he handy!
High pressure was here,
The sky started to clear.
His forecast was certainly dandy.

A guy named Howard Shapiro,
Was our long-time weatherman hero.
It may have been cold
As to us, Howard told,
But still it was well above zero.

Jim and Dave: I'm still working on yours.

Saturday's (Feb. 2) weather was spectacular here in North Florida. The official low at Gainesville Regional Airport was 34 degrees. My house is 20-25 miles northwest of the airport and I do not believe that is was quite that cold here - more like 37. But the high at the airport was 73.

What an awesome day it was. Surely, we still have some cold weather ahead of us but it looks like spring is springing forth. Leaves are already starting to come out on the sweetgum trees.

If you're interested in seeing where I live: http://tinyurl.com/2dj3nf

I've got another question for Paul & Company:

At what depth are the Gulf and Tampa Bay water temperatures taken? If they are measured too close to the surface without good water mixing, the value will be inordinately high due to the effects of sunlight (if taken during the day). And, of course, the deeper the water, the colder the temperature, so you can't measure it at too great a depth.

I have posed this question before not only on these boards but to the NWS, also. And, to-date, no one has been able to answer this question to my satisfaction...

With the cold weather of late (global warming, don't you know), we hear a great deal about wind chill. It is pretty straightforward - at any given temperature and wind speed, there is a corresponding wind chill temperature. That, as we have been told is the apparent temperature to exposed skin. For example, at 28 degrees with a 10MPH wind, the wind chill temperature might be 16 degrees (just a guess - I did not look it up). This means 16 degrees with no wind.

Now the heat index is the apparent ("feels like") temperature taking air temperature and humidity into account. Another example - 93 degrees at 60 percent relative humidity might result in a heat index of 105 degrees.

NOW that heat index temperature is 105 degrees at WHAT relative humidity???

Is it 105 degrees at zero RH? Or is it 105 degrees at some nominal, "comfortable" RH such at 15 or 20 percent?

Paul, Dave, Howard, Andy, Jim...gentlemen, I'm counting on you to come through for me on this one.

Saturday's official low at Gainesville Regional Airport was 28 degrees. I live about twenty miles northwest of the airport. My "Made in China" thermometer only bottomed out in the upper-30's but my wife's birdbaths had about a quarter-inch of ice on them and my garden hoses refused to flow when I got up Saturday am to water some newly-planted trees. Lots of frost, too.

The first of what I am sure will be many freezes here in North Florida before spring.

BTW: The high Saturday was a full 40 degrees warmer - 68. Today (Sunday) was gorgeous with mid-70's.  

I just saw John Wilson on this evening's news state that the extreme drought that has been plaguing northern Georgia may be headed toward Florida.

Are you kidding? I hate to tell you this but it's already HERE. At least in northern Florida albeit to a far lesser degree than they are experiencing farther north.

I can tell you for a fact that North Florida has been experiencing drought since Hurricane Jeanne in 2004. I have a small pond (approx. 40 x 150 feet) on my property and its level has been on a steady downward trend almost continuously since the hurricanes. The only glimmer of hope is that it has come up a slight bit during the past few weeks. We have had some rain and the shorter days and less intense sunlight have reduced evaporation.

But I can tell you for a fact that we have many creeks and streams that are completely dry and I know of at least several small springs (one of which used to feed my pond) that are no longer flowing.

Thankfully, we had a slight semblance of a rainy season in northern Alachua County but far less than the Bay Area has seen (and you think that it was dry HERE?).

Florida needs to wake up. Atlanta isn't that far away!

This post is a question to the Weather Department:

I would be interested in knowing why, when it comes to tornadoes, shear is a necessary ingredient. In other words, with the right combination of atmospheric dynamics - moist air, instability, and shear - tornadoes can form.

Why then, does shear have the opposite effect upon the formation of hurricanes? In other words, tornadoes require shear but hurricanes are torn to pieces by it. I assume that it  has to do with the level of the atmosphere at which the shear occurs.

Thanks in advance!

Eat your hearts out guys. Sunday morning's record low in Gainesville (48) blew away the old record by eight degrees (sorry, Mr. Gore). It is 52 here this morning.

Nothing like sleeping with the windows open! It's 68 here in the house. What I've been doing is closing the windows around 9am to keep the cool air in. My house is pretty well insulated. Even though it got up into the mid-80's yesterday, the air never kicked on until around 3pm.

There's a hint of smoke but not too bad. We had two beautiful rains last week - about an inch Sunday and more like two on Thursday. We're thankful for what we've had but we need oh so much more.

This surely must be spring's last hurrah. All-in-all, a gorgeous weekend!

The next time that it rains (if it ever does again) and I hear someone say that it's "nasty" outside, I am going to blow a gasket.

I had to drive into the little town of High Springs this evening to do some grocery shopping. I thought that I was driving into a thunderstorm. But, of course it wasn't, it was SMOKE.

Remember how terrible the smoke was Tuesday in Pinellas? This was a heck of a lot worse. 

I heard Governor Crist mention praying for rain. That is the ticket. We need rain a LOTS of it.

So come on folks, rain is NOT nasty. Endless days of relentless sun is nasty. And this smoke is downright disgusting.

We need God's help with this  - start praying! 

The recent tornadoes in north central Florida were horrible. The scars from these storms are painful and will take years to heal. Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families. Weather radios are being advocated as a means to prevent the great loss of life that was experienced with this tornadic event. While radios will certainly help, in my opinion, there is a tremendous amount of complacency regarding tornadoes. This, I believe is a fundamental problem that needs to be addressed. Complacency reduction in conjunction with encouragement of residents to purchase radios will help to reduce death tolls in the future.

Allow me to illustrate:

1) How many times have we heard tornado warnings for a “Doppler-indicated” tornado during summertime thunderstorms? The radar has indicated possible rotation and the National Weather Service issues a tornado warning. The residents walk outside, see a great deal of lightning and heavy rain, they see no tornado and they go about their business with no harm done. This is problem #1.

2) The manner in which warnings are issued is also problematic. They are typically issued by county. This can be a problem in large counties. For instance, assume that a tornado is spotted in Davenport which is in extreme northeast Polk County. A warning is issued for Polk County. However, the residents of Bradley Junction in southwestern Polk may very well have sunny skies. This further exacerbates the aforementioned complacency and constitutes problem #2.

In other words, the public needs to be educated – they need to learn to take ANY tornado warning seriously. In the meantime, perhaps there is some way to make warnings more geographically specific. Until such time as warning improvements can be made, we must take this threat seriously each and every time a tornado warning is issued.

And get out and buy a radio - I know that I am go to do so!

I got to wondering if any of you fellow old-timers out there have any copies of the old "Hurricanes 19xx" that were published by WTVT during the Roy Leep administration. If I am not mistaken, the first edition came out in the late-50's.

For those of you that have never seen one, these were high-quality, excellently-researched guides. They were printed on slick card stock paper; in other words, they were far removed from newspaper quality. Not only did they contain all of the pertinent hurricane info and tracking charts that are found in the "hurricane guides" that you get at Publix, but these booklets contained all sorts of meteorological information as well as snipets about the weather personnel on-staff at the time (anyone remember Bill Kowal?).

I still have mine. I have the guides from 1966 through 1972 as well as 1975. I do not know what year is was when Channel 13 quit publishing them, but they were GREAT. And, get this, the station charged only 25 cents for them!

If anyone has these guides from other years, I'd be curious.