More Camera Fun…in Humid Florida

15. August 2012 · Comments Off on More Camera Fun…in Humid Florida · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,

This is my favorite of the batch, really capturing the rainbow colors as the sunlight refracted through the ice clouds. The blueness of the sky really comes through also.

On Tuesday morning at about 8:30am when I let the dog out in the backyard, I saw a thunderstorm building towards the east near Hurlburt Field and Fort Walton Beach.  The rising sun was behind the storm clouds and shining through some ice clouds, causing some pretty diffractions.  This gave me some good opportunity to play with our new camera.

I ran inside, grabbed the camera, ran back outside, uncapped the lens…and everything fogged up.

Argh!

This is an issue here.  Bring a 75F camera outside into warmer 100% humidity and you will get condensation on the lenses.  After last week’s adventures at the butterfly house with the fogging lenses, I had ordered some anti-fog lens cloths from Amazon (along with a spare battery and some other maintenance supplies).  I hadn’t received that order by Tuesday morning (it arrived 6 hours later), so all I could do was stand outside and wait for the lens to clear up.

I was getting impatient, hoping the clouds would continue to cooperate for me…it took about 3-4 minutes before I could get clear pictures.

What I was attempting to photograph were “iridescent clouds“, which occur when ice crystal clouds are between your eyes and the sun.  Learn more about atmospheric optic phenomena here.  There’s all kinds of great stuff to see!

This storm moved east of us, but later that morning we had our own thunderstorm come in from the Pensacola area.  Right after I took these pictures I had gone out for a run (with the kids on their bikes) and we had come home right when it started raining.

Enjoy some of the color variations I could get from my viewing spot in my backyard.  No post-processing was done with these pictures, they’re coming to you straight off the SD card.  The first picture is my favorite of the batch, zoomed in…

The full storm, this is facing east in my backyard. You can see the ice clouds on the right.

Playing with the settings some. I think this was the silhouette setting.

Hi-saturation.

Low saturation.

The refractive effects have nearly dissipated…as the thicker clouds began to dominate.

Debby Does Destin?

24. June 2012 · Comments Off on Debby Does Destin? · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

Where’s she gonna go? What’s she gonna do? The meteorology world is stumped at the moment!

“We interrupt Major Mom’s writings about road trips and being “basic” while we discuss more pressing issues….”

When one lives on the U.S. Gulf Coast, and it’s hurricane season, you have to be ready to put your life on hold whenever a system is forecast to head in your direction.  We learn to keep supplies nearby: batteries, flashlights, Leatherman tools, propane, a camp stove, etc.  We learn to assess our food on hand, and work through the perishables first, in case we lose power.

With all the Tropical Storm Debby news dominating the airwaves, with Jim Cantore reporting from the beach right up the street from here, with my friends on Facebook talking about the craziness they’re seeing at our local Walmart, it’s hard to remain calm.

But I think Dave and I will be quite calm.  We’ve dealt with the east coast of Florida in 2004, and we saw some serious craziness: a week of empty gas pumps to looting to crowds of people ambushing the Publix employee when he rolled a cart of fresh milk to the dairy aisle.

For Miss Debby, the meteorologists are pretty darned stumped.  Forecasting storm intensity depends on the storm track, and the computer models aren’t agreeing on what the storm track is going to do.  So yeah…confusion and delay.  All I can offer to my local friends who are similarly preparing for this storm is to remain aware.  Official updates to the official forecast come out at least every 6 hours (7am, 1pm, 7pm, 1am CDT), you can follow the National Hurricane Center on Twitter and Facebook for the updates to get pushed to you, or you can subscribe to their e-mail service to have watches/warnings and advisories pushed to your email inbox.

I recommend FEMA’s Ready.gov Hurricane Preparedness website, which is a comprehensive source of information that covers the before, during and after event topics regarding tropical weather.  There’s a good suggested preparedness kit here.

All in all, just remain aware, use the media tools available to you, and above all: “Keep Calm and Carry On!”

MilSpouse Friday Fill-in #57

09. September 2011 · 1 comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

I haven’t done too much blogging this past week, things were crazy with Dave having a medical procedure last Friday.  Then we were stuck in the house for 3 days straight as tropical storm conditions and tornado warnings dominated the Florida Panhandle.  It was challenging keeping the kids entertained, but we came through it just fine and are now greeted with low temperatures in the upper 50s!  It’s been nice to open up the house….

I was happy to catch up on my Handmade Afghans to Thank Our Armed Forces Project work over the weekend, too.

I get the rectangles sent to me with the design plan and I assemble them into twin-bed sized afghans.  They’re then shipped to military hospitals worldwide.

1. My plans for Labor Day included renting a giant inflatable slip n slide for a unit BBQ at our house, but what really happened was we were inundated by a foot of rain and tropical storm force winds all weekend as Tropical Storm Lee made landfall just west of us over the weekend.

2. Call me crazy, but sometimes I just need to just sit and play some Bejeweled Blitz on Facebook.  I’m so addicted to that game.  It’s all my sister’s fault, she was always my #1 challenge since 2008 or so.

3. One of the funniest things I’ve seen lately is an older episode of Fox’s Family Guy, a show that I love (perhaps that’s a better answer to #2?).  The Emmy-winning episode is titled “Road to the Multiverse“.  Stewie (baby) and Brian (the dog) invent a machine that takes them to assorted parallel universes.  It was incredibly clever and creative.  In fact, there’s 3-4 minutes where the Family Guy characters were all drawn like Disney animation.

4. It’s strange, but folding laundry drives me crazy while vacuuming is perfectly fine with me!  I will vacuum 4-5x per week, but unfolded laundry will sit for nearly a week while I do all the other housework first.

5. One, two, buckle my shoe… three, four _open that door!  In the wake of Tropical Storm Lee, I can happily open up my house and turn off the air conditioner for the first time in about 10 weeks!  It’s magnificent!

Thoughts on Irene…

26. August 2011 · 1 comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags:

This is a representative forecast, click here for the latest!

Our thoughts and prayers are with those preparing for the onset of Hurricane Irene.  My family experienced the crazy 2004 Hurricane Season on the East Coast of Florida.  We packed both cars, both kids, our dog, and our most valuable belongings and tearfully evacuated our house in Melbourne, Florida for Hurricane Frances just before Labor Day.  Our house did relatively well in 2004, we are very grateful for that.

When an order is given to evacuate, it’s done with a LOT of thought and consideration to the financial impacts on everyone they’re moving.  One of the things emergency managers are considering is how easily rescues can be made afterwards.

I’m not giving you a special forecast….refer to the National Hurricane Center or your favorite weather forecast outlet for your forecast.

  • Please heed local emergency management authorities.  FEMA, state, and local emergency management agencies have learned many lessons from 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina: they’re more prepared than ever to respond, decide and inform.
  • Have a disaster preparedness kit handy (flashlights, matches, water, battery radio, clothes in plastic bags) if you choose to stay.  Ready.gov, the Department of Homeland Security’s public website, has this handy tri-fold pamphlet that covers basic needs handily.
  • Fill your cars with gas.  Local gas stations remained empty or near empty after Hurricanes Frances and Jeanne for several days.
  • Be prepared to lose perishables in your fridge and not have perishables at your local grocery store for several days.  The good news is that many homeowners’ and renters’ insurance policies will cover replacement of spoiled perishable foods, perhaps without a deductible.  Check your policy for this.
  • Do you have pets?  Get to know if local shelters take pets or not.  Prepare ahead of time for your pet’s care in case of an evacuation or prolonged power outages if you don’t evacuate.  Do you have 2+ weeks of pet food?  Consider it.

Road Trip 2011: Tornado Season 2011 Up Close…

30. June 2011 · Comments Off on Road Trip 2011: Tornado Season 2011 Up Close… · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , , , ,

The route we planned from Florida to Pennsylvania took us right across some of the destruction paths from this past spring’s Tornado “Superoutbreak” of April 25-28.  On this trip I crossed three of this past spring’s tornado paths, each are discussed below.

While part of me as a “weather weenie” finds a fascination in getting to see a tornado in action (I’ve never seen one…but that’s for another discussion), I also find incredible sorrow in seeing what can get left in it wake and the pure helplessness society experiences about it.  You rarely can get more than 10 minutes’ notice once landfall has been detected, and if the tornado is large enough (such as with Joplin, MO), even 10 minutes won’t help save your valuables; the best you can do is protect yourself.

The pictures here are not mine, we proceeded so quickly through each of these areas I didn’t have the time to get the camera ready.

This experience also had me thinking about those poor folks who were innocently driving on I-59, I-81 or I-91 and suddenly a tornado screams across in their path!  I also thought about all the victims, dead and alive, and the families dealing with the aftereffects.  Our thoughts and prayers are with you all.

About a week before I left for my vacation, a college friend had sent me some pictures from his trips to Joplin, Missouri to help clean up.

Joplin, Missouri.  This isn’t my friend’s picture, but his are VERY similar!
After this once-in-a-generation awful tornado season, here’s hoping for a safe and effective cleanup and recovery.
The Red Cross is still working with victims of all these storms — please take a moment to consider helping out, either by donating supplies through a local charity collection, or else via the American Red Cross website itself.  You can also text “REDCROSS” to the number 90999 for a quick and easy $10 donation to be added to your cell phone bill.  This is a contribution to their generic disaster relief fund, which is also supporting the midwest flooding and southwest wildfire relief efforts.

Trenton, GA

Remnants of home swept off a ridge overlooking Trenton, GA after an EF-3 tornado on April 27, 2011.  Photo: National Weather Service

We weren’t expecting it, but as we proceeded northeastward up Interstate 59 in Georgia, we pass through the small town of Trenton that’s abuzz with bulldozer and crane activity.  The trees that lined the interstate were destroyed.  We see piles of rubble on top of foundations.  Zipping by at 70+ mph, we saw it all so fast, it was tough to process what we had seen.

Two were killed in Trenton, GA.

I had a little bit of Fujita-scale forensics education in college, so I remember that piles of rubble on foundations being indicative of strong EF-3/weak EF-4 damage.  I looked up the details of the storm and the National Weather Service, Peachtree, GA office actually tracked not one but TWO tornados through Trenton, GA during the April 2011 superoutbreak.  Look for the “Dade/Walker” tornadoes in the far northwest corner of Georgia on the interactive map.

Glade Springs, VA

On I-81 in extreme southwest Virginia, as the sun was setting, the family was admiring the orangeish glow on the mountains to our east as we drove through the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Then we see a swath of dead trees cut into the side of the mountain.  And again with the bulldozers!  This was the town of Glade Springs, VA, which experienced an EF-2 tornado the night of April 27th.

Another tornado damage path across the interstate???

Springfield, MA

This one really took me by surprise, since I made a last-minute decision to take I-91 straight south through Massachusetts out of Vermont on Monday.

On June 1st, a tornado struck downtown Springfield, killing 4 people.  The National Weather Service confirmed it as an EF-3.

Reminiscent of the aftermath of the 2004 hurricane season that our family experienced, just south of downtown Springfield, blue tarps dominated the rooftops.  Once again we were greeted with the telltale broken tree trunks and blown over road signs.  The track of the storm was nearly perpendicular to I-91.

I was thinking about how old the town of Springfield, Mass. is and how old many of those buildings must have been.  Statistically, such strong tornadic thunderstorms are rare in New England.

R.I.P. Webcam (for now…)

26. April 2011 · 2 comments · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

The webcam on my HBTS Rexford St. Weather Underground setup is dead.

I don’t think it’s the webcam itself, it’s most likely the laptop that was hosting the webcam.  That dastardly “kitchen laptop” that I’ve kept alive all. these. years.

Anyhoo, since the screen on the laptop isn’t working, I have to plug it into our TV with a VGA cable to see what it’s up to.  For all I know, it’s probably some update to the software that I need to download or something like that.

I’ll check it out later this week — I’ve a bunch of odds and ends to tend to.  New license plate for the Prius (switching from Nebraska back to Florida), squaring away our Family Care Plan, and finally squaring away our claims from our move.

In the meantime, I’ve removed the blankness on the tag to the right so conserve a little space.

My New Commuter Life, Part II: Just Because I Now Live in Florida….

07. March 2011 · Comments Off on My New Commuter Life, Part II: Just Because I Now Live in Florida…. · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , , , ,

….doesn’t mean I never have to see snow again, right?

Or drive in the snow again?

(As promised in my previous post, here’s the story of why I’ll never buy a Ford Mustang north of the Mason/Dixon line!)

On last weekend’s trip to Omaha, I was fortunate to travel in between major winter weather systems.  Temperatures were in the 50s on my first day there, quite nice!

We were forecasting 1-2″ of snow on Thursday, February 24th.  We told EVERYONE 1-2″, and not just us: the National Weather Service, the television stations, everyone!

What happened was pretty freakish, didn’t last that long, and happened right on top of the afternoon/evening commute home.  I only caught one iPhone screen capture of the event’s Doppler radar.  I wish I had taken more:

You know how folks talk about great things (or not-so-great things) that happen when “all the stars are aligned?”  Well, in this case, several things “aligned” in the atmosphere to make this nearly-horizontal dark green line form across central Nebraska.  I’m not going to get into the wintertime “convective symmetric instability” here.  That line is HEAVY SNOW, and it dumped about 5″ of snow in 3 hours in Bellevue and in areas just south of Offutt AFB.  And the line barely moved for those 3 hours.  It was NUTS!

And I got to drive home in it.  Whee!

I had reported for duty very early that morning, so I figured I’d be heading home around 1:00-1:30pm, but at the last minute I had a meeting that took me to about 3:00pm.  The movement of this line was very slow, and I was itching to leave for the day, so after a few minutes of monitoring a non-moving line, I bit the bullet and left.  If I had left when I thought I’d be leaving, I’d have made it back to where I was staying without incident.  Instead, I fishtailed and skidded all the way back, with heavy snow making things all the worse.

I ending up coming back into my old neighborhood right as my boys’ former elementary school was letting out.  The neighborhood is hilly, and there were cars slipping and sliding everywhere.  Since only 1-2″ of snow was originally forecast, the salt/silt trucks didn’t even come out to prepare the roads.  What a horrific mess!

I couldn’t get that #$%  Mustang up the last hill before getting to the house.  I tried several times, but it just wasn’t happening.  If there wasn’t so much after-school traffic, I might have had the room to roll backwards down the hill, and get enough speed to do it.  But I simply had to abandon the car about a block from where I was staying, and walk in the heavy snowfall, and on unshoveled sidewalks, to the house.  I had my full winter-weather gear, and nice warm boots, at least.  It wasn’t a long walk.  Uphill, of course.

About 1/2 hour later, my hostess loaded a few supplies into her Suburban and drove me back over to the car.  With less traffic, I was able to roll backwards back down the hill and tear with full power up the hill to the house.  And here it is right after I got it parked — POINTING DOWNHILL on the legal side of the street.

How incredibly frustrating — I’m not a bad winter-weather driver.  I could hold my own in places like Pennsylvania, Ohio and South Korea.  Even our 2 1/2 years in Nebraska, we were fine even driving our Toyota Prius.  But with this Mustang, I was dealing with a very lightweight, rear-wheel drive vehicle.  Ugh!

The local National Weather Service office had put out this map of snowfall totals from that one event, note how there was 5+” of snow in a narrow ribbon across south-central eastern Nebraska, but NONE in northern Sarpy and Douglas Counties.  Downtown Omaha saw no snow, but 10 miles to the south was buried in 5-6″ of snow that fell in just 3-4 hours.

Image created by the National Weather Service office, Omaha/Valley, Nebraska

There were cold temperatures and snow showers for the next couple days of my stay in the Omaha area, and the snowy weather turned into a freezing rain risk that lasted right up until just a couple hours before my flight out on the 27th.  Since I was heading into work each day at about 4:45am, luckily I could slip and slide around without other cars in the way.  It was nerve-wracking, but I survived.

I’m so glad the next time I head to Nebraska will be well after the winter-weather is done.  I’ll only have to worry about tornadoes next time…

Next up, Part III: a happier post about my fun times on this trip: trying out Ethiopian food, enjoying Pokeno with the girls, and shopping at my favorite store, Trader Joe’s!

South Facing FAIL

03. January 2011 · Comments Off on South Facing FAIL · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags:

It didn’t take long to realize that pointing the webcam south would be a big mistake.  For starters, the best windows to use were set in some by a front porch — so the view was competing with a soffitt, plus the neighbors’ houses.  Dave pointed out to me that we weren’t showing much of the sky at all.

Around 1:30pm, the sun was plainly visible in the webcam view…and nothing else!  Huge glares!

So we have re-aimed the webcam towards the north, and that’s where it’ll stay for the time being.  I’d personally prefer it to be pointing south, especially in the summer, and maybe we’ll have our IP camera by then.

Webcam is Back!

03. January 2011 · Comments Off on Webcam is Back! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: ,

We haven’t completely worked out where we’re going to put it yet, but we have our webcam back running.

Like last time, we’re pointing it out the front of the house, through the window. It’s pointing SOUTH, so we should be able to see systems coming in from off the Gulf.

It won’t work at night.

Since our kitchen laptop’s monitor doesn’t work, we’re using a lot of trial and error on how to aim it. We might even have to zoom in some to get the our roof and our neighbors’ houses out of the view.

We’re considering an inexpensive “IP Camera” to replace this setup.  An IP Camera doesn’t need a supporting computer, just let it ride on your network, and you can make changes from any computer on the network.  Just type in the IP address (like how you could adjust settings on your wireless router).

Our Weather Station is BACK!

13. December 2010 · Comments Off on Our Weather Station is BACK! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

We re-assembled our weather station in our backyard over the weekend. We have plenty of fenceline to choose from, and you can’t see the equipment from the street (always a bonus in a deed-restricted neighborhood).

You can see current conditions on the right-hand column of the blog now, or you can click on the “sticker” and save that page to your favorites.

We also have several other local weather stations with which we can compare our data. I’m not quite sure our wind vane/anemometer set is high enough off the ground, we have some wind direction inconsistencies that we’ll monitor for the next several days.

It’s nice to have this back, especially for rainfall information…we can use that data to assess whether I have to water plants.

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