[Magdalen] Thunder.

[Jay Weigel]

My dad was a meteorologist on a seaplane tender in WWII. At that time,
weather forecasting consisted of getting up about 4:30 am, getting in a
dinghy after drinking a cup or so of very bad wardroom coffee, getting in a
seaplane, and flying around for an hour or so checking out the situation.
They had to know the prevailing winds etc. plus be in contact with the
weather officers on all ships in the area plus in the area in which their
pilots were supposed to fly that day. There was no weather radar and
certainly no space shots of weather systems. He really wanted to continue
his study of meteorology when he left the military, but somehow got steered
in other directions; however, it remained a strong interest for him and he
kept up with developments in the field. When he moved to Knoxville he
always said he'd hate to be the weatherman there because of the difficulty
of accurately forecasting what systems would do when they hit that broad
valley between the Cumberlands and the Smokies, particularly as unstable
warm air often filtered up from the Gulf of Mexico.

I know that's long and roundabout, but I seem to recall, David, that you
said you likewise live between two ranges, and that would account for the
weather people being "inaccurate".

Jay, who lives between the Appalachians and the Blue Ridge and suffers from
the same phenomenon

On Fri, Aug 7, 2015 at 10:15 AM, Cantor03--- via Magdalen <
magdalen at herberthouse.org> wrote:

>
>
> In a message dated 8/6/2015 11:49:15 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
> houstonklr at gmail.com writes:
>
> so they  said on the
> weather...>>>>>>
>
>
>
> I realize weather forecasting is an inexact science, but the weather
> authorities seem to be especially unable to forecast in the NE
> Pennsylvania
> region.
>
> For example, if we had as much summer rain as they actually  forecasted,
> we'd all be in the Arc.  Maybe once in ten tries they are on the  money.
>
> Strangely, the weather people cannot even predict the weather in a  given
> area the day before, or even on the morning of a day.
>
> Thus, IMHO, they should stick to weather reporting.  They can  look
> out the window and report rain, and such statistics as the  temperature.
> Why bother with "forecasts?"
>
>
> David Strang - Being hard on the weather authorities.
>
>
>