Being in the civil service, we are able to book Cluny Lodge, a bungalow owned by the Singapore government. D often suggested we stay there, but I kept putting it off because I liked Strawberry Park & am usually lazy to try anything new. Our colleague C the Toothbrush Man brought his family there to stay once, though, & after hearing about it from him I decided to give it a try.
Lane leading to Cluny Lodge, lined by firs supposedly planted by Lee Kuan Yew; Cluny Lodge in morning sunlig
When Pat & I returned to Singapore, we were each assigned to understudy a senior forecaster and started operational work. The shift considered of a 6-day cycle : 2 day shifts, then a night shift followed by 3 days off. The first day shift was devoted to aviation and shipping, while the second involved public weather forecasts, issuing TAFs & trend statements & sending out lightning risk warnings to various clients, mostly golf courses & construction companies. Night shift include
We had a flurry of calls from the police, civil defence and the public today, because a distinct waterspout was sighted off the southeastern coast of the island.
Our radar showed that the weather system producing it was just a small thunderstorm. Which goes to show that you don't need a large and impressive thunderstorm to produce an impressive waterspout.
What is as amazing as the waterspout is the speed at which news travels nowadays. Practically everyone on this island has a cellphone
"Sun Sad" by Mike Muk
The smoke haze is back in Singapore. It made front page news in the local newspapers & was reported in Channel News Asia as well. Quite a number of people also sent hazy photos to the Stomp website. The National Environment Agency (of which Met Services Division is a part) has also posted a haze update on its website.
For the haze to be such a newsworthy item actually speaks well for our usual air quality - in some large cities, smog prevails every day & such at
Dec 20, 2006 24 hours of rain mayhem Floods and landslides hit island Fallen trees hold up traffic SINGAPORE was lashed by the third-largest deluge of rain in recorded history yesterday, causing heavy flooding in parts of the island, bringing down trees and triggering landslides. The rain was most intense over the northern and central parts of the island, where flooding affected at least four locations. Vehicles were diverted from several traffic junctions, which had been rendered impassable
Meant to post this earlier, but all the bluster about the haze overtook me. I've always wanted to own an environmentally-friendly car; looks like that wish may be realised in the near future. However, at present the cost of hybrid cars is still beyond my pocket.
INDUSTRIES Our Strategy Our approach towards industries is a "win-win" one. We acknowledge that industries in Singapore produce largely for international markets. Therefore, regulations that are too tight may create compliance costs that force industries to relocate elsewhere, with an adverse impact on the Singaporean economy without a significant reduction in global greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore, we will focus on improving the energy efficiency of our industries, which not only lowers the
My first post. I have been wanting to keep a weather blog for some time, because after working for a no. of years in this field, I find that there are quite a lot of memorable events I'd like to record down. I didn't plan to be a meteorologist initially. I did physics at uni & wasn't sure what I wanted to do after that. Most of my classmates planned to teach, or join something related to the electronics sector. In my 2nd yr, one of my lecturers, Dr Lim Hock, gave a lecture on meteorology. I
A Von Karman vortex street caused by the airflow over the island of Jan Mayen in the Greenland Sea :
Such vortices can be seen in many other places; these trails off Alaska's Aleutian Islands are even more spectacular :
I must confess I have a soft spot for the Jan Mayen vortices, though, because Jan Mayen was where I first heard of the phenomenon ... the book Spacious Skies had several photos of them. I find them amazing - never realised such regular & intricate cloud patterns existed
Noticed this in Craig's post under the South China Heatwave thread. Yep, good names. :lol: Spring Begins Feb 4 Rain Water Feb 19 Awakening of Insects Mar 6 Spring Equinox Mar 21 Clear and Bright Apr 5 Grain Rains Apr 20 Summer Begins May 6 Grain Fills May 21 Grain in Ear Jun 6 Summer Solstice Jun 21 Slight Heat Jul 7 Great Heat Jul 23 Autumn Begins Aug 8 End of Heat Aug 23 White Dew Sep 8 Autumn Equinox Sep 23 Cold Dew Oct 8 Hoar Frost Oct 23 Winter Begins Nov 7 Little Snow Nov 22 Great Sno
I came across these photos as I was looking through some of my old files. Not sure where they came from, but this is quite a nice water spout.
That's one of our container terminals in the foreground, possibly Tanjong Pagar.
Besides doing civilian work at Changi Airport, we also have forecasters stationed at military airbases around the island. There was a shortage of manpower at one time, so several of the Changi forecasters had to cover duty there, including me.
The work consisted mainly of monitoring the weather and issuing a warning if a thunderstorm was going to affect the airbase. It was a good experience because I did a lot more outdoor observation there than I did at Changi. In Changi, we were issuing warni
A water spout was spotted off Sentosa's Siloso Beach on 14 Aug, according to an article in the local newspaper, The Straits Times.
In the article, "A Sentosa spokesman said such waterspouts are common but they never occur on the island. 'Usually, they are very far away but can be seen from Sentosa. They don't last long,' he added."
Unfortunately I don't have access to that day's radar pictures (only the last two hours are available online) or we would be able to have a look at the weather
THE ASMC
A few days after I started work, I discovered that MSS was hosting a research centre called the ASMC (ASEAN Specialised Meteorological Centre). At that time there were three scientists attached there, Dr Rosa Perez from PAGASA (the Philippines' Met. Office) and Tukul Rameyo Adi & Suratno from BMG, Indonesia. Adi and Suratno were not exactly meteorologists but doing some technical work for BMG. Adi once showed me his wedding photo & I couldn't help laughing because although he l
Writing a weather book, that is. This was published in 2003 but I only just chanced upon it while browsing through Select Books, a local book website. It goes without saying that I ordered it straight away. Am looking forward to reading it. As I mentioned before, I still hope Singapore will one day have its own little pocket guide book on weather for the public.
Asian Aerospace is an international trade fair for the aerospace business. It was based at the Changi Exhibition Centre near Changi Airport for a number of years, and is the biggest airshow event in Asia. A Liaison Officer (L.O.) is usually attached to each of the high-ranking foreign delegates coming to attend the Exhibition. The L.O.'s job is basically to receive the delegate when he arrives at the airport, facilitate and ensure his attendance at the various meetings, & send him off when h
After the Hurricane Workshop in Miami, I met D at Heathrow & we rented a car & drove straight to Wales. It might have been more logical to stay on in the U.S. & have a holiday there, but I wasn't so familiar with getting around the U.S. & driving on the right side of the road; I'd lived a year in the UK & I wanted a holiday where I could really relax. I chose Wales because I'd already been around Scotland & England.
Some of the places we visited were Tenby, Aberystwyth,
The smoke haze in southern Kalimantan is looking bad. The people there must be almost suffocating.
If winds in the area remain easterly/southeasterly, it's going to drift over to Singapore ... :lol:
In early 1998, we heard that a team of mountaineers from Singapore was planning to try climbing Mt Everest. They were hoping MSS could provide them with weather data, & I remember two of the team (I think Khoo Swee Chiow & Johann Annuar) coming to our office to have a look at what was available. Unlike the days of Edmund Hillary, things are so high-tech now that we were able to email the data to them every day.
Since that first expedition, there have been many others, but at the time it
I've been reading through the Singapore government's Climate Change Strategy recently, & I'm actually quite impressed by it. The panel seems to have explored every possible area in which the climate change issue can be addressed, & the policies mentioned seem sound & pragmatic (of course, reports like these are often beautifully written but don't reveal the entire reality, however in this case I'm being positive & giving them the benefit of the doubt ).
I found much of the repo
While reading about the Singapore government's Climate Change Strategy I wasn't too clear on how carbon trading works but this Shell advertisement actually does quite a good job of explaining it. Encouraging businesses to clean up Most people agree we need to reduce the level of carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere. It is a global problem which needs global solutions. One way is to use the power of the world’s markets to provide businesses with a strong incentive to clean up. Carbon Trad
Well, we still have some way to go before biofuels are used in Singapore. But at least this is a beginning.
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The Straits Times
Oct 9, 2006
From DIY biodiesel to slick new venture
By Leong Chan Teik
IF ALL cars in Singapore ran on diesel, some motorists here might discover a new hobby: making their own fuel. Mr Kom Mam Sun, 32, hit on the idea two yea
Oct 12, 2006 Wind shifts make predictions hard: NEA Weather forecast is tricky in the tropics where patterns are weak By Arti Mulchand WHY is the crystal ball so hazy, one might ask. It would be better if the weatherman could say in advance if haze levels were going to go up or down. But the fact is that the light and constantly changing winds, characteristic at this time of the year, make it hard to predict what will happen, said the National Environment Agency (NEA). The region is experie
This is what the sun looked like outside my window this morning, through the haze :
The haze is still dominating the news ... lots of articles every day, radio DJ keeps giving a PSI update every 20 minutes, & there are colourful new graphics as well. Guess our Director-General is having sleepless nights - D said he came over to the operations office at least 10 times the other day, no surprise what with the Perm Sec, Minister & people from MEWR all bugging him.
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