Snow + Cold = Low on Blood
February 1st, 2011 | Bill KirkThe American Red Cross reports 10s of thousands of blood donors haven't been able to donate due to the extreme cold and snow across much of the country this Winter. Reports show blood supplies for this time of year are the lowest in 10 years and in this case blaming the weather is certainly a valid reason.
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U.S. gets a D- in Science & Math
January 27th, 2011 | Bill KirkThis week 3,500 scientists, meteorologists, climatologists, students, businesses and weather organizations gathered in Seattle, Washington for the 91st Annual Meeting of the American Meteorological Society (AMS). The theme of the 2011 AMS Annual Meeting is “Communicating Weather and Climate” but a government report out this week shows just how poorly U.S. students compare to their international counterparts when it comes to the importance of academic disciplines in advanced math, physics and science.
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How Winter forecasts are really made?
January 22nd, 2011 | Bill KirkThere have been 395 record low temperatures tied or broken so far in January across the U.S. with some notable extremes. It's hard to call this "record cold" but +51F (10C) was a new all time January record low in Waimea, Hawaii on January 5th. Even the big city Honolulu, Hawaii broke a record at +56F (13C) but take that down a 100 degrees for the real cold stuff like -51F (-46C) in Central Alaska, -47F (-44C) in Dickinson North Dakota breaking the 117 year record or -46F (-43C) yesterday in International Falls, Minnesota breaking an 82 year old record. So how are Winter forecasts really made? The secret revealed!
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Bad science destroys Queensland. Who's next?
January 18th, 2011 | Bill KirkBy now we've all heard that the flooding in Queensland, Australia, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Brazil, etc. etc. is all due to "man-made Global Warming!" Diane Sawyer here in the U.S. said so on national TV this week so it must be true? Her guest was Professor RichardSomerville a "climate scientist" from the University of California – he sounded credible and after all 2010 was the wettest year ever; record heat killed 56 thousand people in Russia; record cold and snow across the Northern Hemisphere for the 4th straight winter; record freezes in Florida - it's all man-made Global Warming a sign of things to come (oops – we should use the new term "Climate Disruption" - Global Warming is so 2009). All of this may indeed be a sign of things to come but nothing to do with "Global Warming" as there isn't any - not on land and definitely not in the Oceans!
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49 of 50 U.S. States (71%) Covered in Snow!
January 12th, 2011 | Bill KirkFor the 2nd year in a row 49 of 50 U.S. states have some snow on the ground! On the 13th of February 2010 all states but Hawaii were covered in snow including Florida with 68.1% of the U.S. covered. This time Florida has escaped the snow but Hawaii, yes Hawaii, has snow on the top of Mauna Kea at 13,796 feet (4,205 meters). A whopping 70.9% of the U.S. is covered in snow - most likely the most since the 1970s and possibly the late 1800s.
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WT360's Weather Super Hero Sighting?
January 7th, 2011 | Bill KirkHello Earthlings, I'm your new WT360 super weather hero to save you from boring weather forecasts and other earthly calamities! My objective is simple to spread awareness about future YEAR-AHEAD weather. My motive is a little bit more complex: to get people to believe that weather matters.
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Bye...Bye...Blackbird :(
January 4th, 2011 | Bill KirkSo what killed 5,000 red-winged black birds in Beebe Arkansas New Year's Eve? The testing is underway but the conspiracy theories suggest they all hit a UFO and plunged to their deaths (least likely), weather blogs say it was severe thunderstorms - lightning, hail and strong up drafts and others say it was fireworks. We'll examine the facts that we know so far and look at other things that have fallen from the heavens over the years...
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