full_frontal_occlusion

Excellent idea then maybe those actions will also ensure the global nuclear war we need to justify the cost of Trident. ffO.

BFTP and RJS. Thank you for the efforts taken to put together your LRF. You and the others who take the time to produce unorthodox LRF's and present them in such a public forum are akin to presenting a paper for peer review. That takes courage. Thank you. Staying professional in ones approach is a laudible aim. I'm sure the authors would be the first to acknowledge that it takes a very, very long time for such prediction methodologies to become accepted as an accurate tool That means an accuracy significantly better than chance, measured objectively over decades. One cannot rush the seasons any more than one can hold back the tide. I wish you success in the outcome for the season ahead. ffO.

Did you stub your toe on something?

Cosmic neighbourhood indeed. NASA are a tease. How old is it again? 30 years? Someone forgot to mention you need to add 50,000,000 years or so. ffO.

Hmmmm. I rest my case.

Apparently, they were inspired by Status Quo. ffO.

Doing a little more digging, the news conference will be hosted by the director of the astrophysics division and two astrophysicists: Kimberly Weaver: specialising in black hole formation, starburst galaxies, galactic nucleii Alexei Fillipenko: specialising in supernovae, black holes, gamma ray bursts and the expansion of the universe The specialisation appearing in both of those credentials is black holes. If so, the discovery of a black hole forming in our local neighberhood would be of great scientific interest. But like the mention of the word wrt LHC, it would cause alarm amongst the general public and may spark a media frenzy. I wait to be blown away (nahhhht). ffO.

'In our cosmic neighbourhood' are the precise words. Meaning it could be anything fron within the solar system to within our local cluster of galaxies? Wide open to speculation. Chandra is an X-ray telescope so whatever it is they have discovered, will be emiitting in that part of the spectrum. My guess could be: i) Something to do with the recent discovery of gamma ray sources perpendicular to the plane of our galactic disc at our galactic core ii) One star in a binary system swallowing its companion iii) A red giant swallowing a planet iv) A new star forming which will likely iginte it's nuclear furnace imminently and become visible in the night sky v) A dying star about to go supernova and hence spectacularly brighter. I have a feeling though, we're all going to be terribly disappointed. Will this be a publicity stunt using viral-hyperbole to generate an unprecedented global audience for their webcast? It can't be that interesting, after all, none of the worlds press have jumped on it and no high ranking government official is scheduled to give an interview. Such is the way NASA is desperate to maintain a presence in the face of it's changing role under successive administrations. ffO.

Accepting that the propensity to support life may be prevalent throughout our own dimensional-space, given what we are learning about the apparent abundance of water, exoplanets, Goldilock zones etc etc. Here are my thoughts: There are several things that may thwart us in our chance of discovering or meeting intelligent life: 1) Both intelligences must co-exist simultaneously. We have not developed to the point of interstellar travel and that's 4.54 billion years after the earth was created (6000 years if you are a creationist). We don't know how long we will survive in this elevated state of awareness, there are many ways that our term as dominant species could terminate abruptly not least of which is self destruction. 2) The most successful species to ever exist on earth was the dinosaur which frankly, eclipses our own timescale to insignificance. As far as we know, dinosaurs did not evolve higher intelligence. The equilibrium state for their stability lasted 160 million years compared to humans few thousand years at best. A ratio of 50,000:1 3) Our evolutionary path was shaped by chance events: orbital cycles, geography, volcanism, meteor strike, plate tectonics etc. which wiped out one matrix and allowed another more adapted to the new environmental order. Given those observations, it would be logical to assume (but not prove) that the dinosaur type of longevity and level of development becomes the rule and that humans are the exception. Thus, the required overlap in existence time-frames for a meeting between intelligent life, reduces their odds very considerably. I don't subscribe to Hawkings ideas of any intelligent alien life being less than benevolent in intent: Our survival and proliferation is a result of co-operation replacing survival of the fitest. Most technological advancements and have come through co-operating to survive wars. It follows that alien life evolving to the state of interstellar travel, have done so through similar co-operation and would realise long ago that continued existence demands nothing less than continued co-operation. Survivable interstellar travel is not proven. In short, I acknowledge intelligent life may exist elsewhere in our universe. However, the odds of meeting them are very, very remote. ffO.

Very much less than 120 mph. Probably half that. Once you are unsettled by the gust (quite easy) and moving, then to gain stabiity again, you will not only need to overcome the force of the wind, but also negate the momentum of your own body relative to the ground. Moreover, once unseated, there is now no friction to stop your acceleration. Which is why as Helen of the North observes going with the wind is more difficult to control. Get low down on all fours to lower your C of G, generate more friction with the ground and present less surface area to the wind. If you come into contact with a stationary object, then the lower that contact is with your body, the greater the leverage force of the wind. i.e. The object acts as a fulcrum and leverages you to fall over. You also need to consider the type of clothes you are wearing as they will act like a parachute. ffO

Not every missile test is made public. I'm sure there would be a NOTAM if one digs deep enough. There are one or two secret satellite tests ongoing. X37B is a distinctly possible contender and this may well be a test to detect missile launches by sensors on that craft. Also bear in mind thet the X37B was launched 7 months ago with a nine month classified mission profile and an undisclosed orbit which was changed recently. The US Navy has said it does not know where the missile originated, but then the X37B is not a Navy craft, it is operated by the USAF. The media loves a good conspiracy almost as much as the gullible public who want to believe in the absurd when a mundane explanation is vastly more probable. ffO.

Is that an 'educated' guess? Please give us the full extent of your profound wisdom.

Now there's a good question. NWP range is limited by so many sources of error: currently available computational grid resolution, interpolation, extrapolation (and interpretation) of data from monitoring stations, mesoscale topology, ocean dynamics, insolation coupling, cloud modelling. Then there is chaos theory and the unpredictablility of atomic decay. Teleconnections, oscillation indices, torques etc. all offer a bigger picture but only to the extent of balancing probabilities. Because these techniques are rooted in statistics, there will never be an accurate and repeatable way of coupling the outputs of these emerging lr techniques with that of short range NWP. We're left with interpretation limited by experience and a good deal of random chance. Don't get me wrong, lrp in the mould of Galacier Point, Chiono' and a few others will statistically give a better chance of accuracy tipped on the positive side of 50:50 (say 70:30 if I'm being generous). It will never be entirely accurate, hence will always be accompanied by a healthy dose of caveat emptor. ffO.

The media - in particular the owners and editors of the media - imho are responsible for more and bloodier wars than religion. They can destroy lives, whole companies, industries and demonise cultures to stoke war without any accountability and then hide behind the protection of democracy and freedom of speech. I'm not suggesting for one second we abandon of the latter two, but surely there needs to be some 'stiffer' incentive to responsible reporting. ffO.

The first data set from the GOCE satellite were released 9th June, but only today is the level-2 data for the gravity field model released during the 'Living Planet' symposium in Bergen, Norway. As an amateur meteorologist, if you look at the hi-def images, one can't help but be stunned by the similarities between the positions of gravity troughs and ridges which strikingly match the positioning of global teleconnection features. Particulary the NAO, ENSO, AO and PNA are clearly visible. We are on the cusp of some powerful new tools for both climatology and LRP, allowing us to start predicting teleconnection behaviour rather than mere interpretation and temporal pattern matching from indices. Expect scientific papers to hit the stores within a few months along with the first teleconnection predictions. As Scotty would say 'I like it here, it's exciting!' ffO. Image here ESA video GOCE information here

Did you remember to feed the gas meter this morning?

Sounds like a NASA geologist jumping on the publicity bandwagon. The physics explanation is perfectly plausible - think about how an ice skater controls the rate and center of spin by extending or retracting limbs. This is the same as shifting a large land mass either closer to or away from the earths centre of mass. However, whilst a limb is a significant percentage of a skaters mass and therefore change in rotation is equally large, the mass shfted due to an earthquake is a very small percentage of the earths mass and an even less perceptible shift in position. A couple of microseconds a day would mean we need to add a 'leap day' every 1400 years or so. Of course the effect is likely completely swamped by plate tectonics at subduction and heave boundaries - mountain ranges where plates meet. I really wouldn't lose (a couple of microseconds) sleep over it. ffO.

So, in the next 48 hours we have potentially the biggest fall of snow for Scotland since the early 80's and where is everyone..........?

Wherever it happens over the next week, somewhere in this motley collection of islands will get pasted and as is always the case, the higher up one is the better the chances. As others have stated numerous times before, the positioning of the lows and their trajectories are all important. The tolerance errors for this kind of set up dictate even mesoscale models will struggle to define the actual lowland snow areas until 18 hrs or less before the event. ffO.

What also shows up very clearly are the SST's associated with the established El Nino pattern in the tropical central Pacific. Later today I will update my observations from the GSDM and hence prognosis for the extended range in the technical discussion thread. ffO.

Doh!....

Apologies TWS, gotta pull you up on this one: The Atlantic varying in FI is a direct function of Heisenbergs uncertainty principle and nothing to do with power-factor which is simply the product between voltage and current in sinusoidal AC systems. ffO.

and With all the teleconnections favouring continued cold into March (even if tempered by seasonal factors), it does begin to look as if the downward propagation of the MMW is beginning to affect model evolution towards a NE'ly blast. Looking forward to the verification. ffO.

Thanks CC and Chiono', very informative and more akin to my thoughts about southerly tracking lows before John Holmes blog yesterday. Lets see if those zonals are more compliant and the Siberian blocking keeps taking the Ritilin to hold back from pushing the action too far west. ffO.

CC. All of the signals appear to back up your assertion, but like last year and the MMW that never was or this years Siberian high in need of Ritilin, it's a good trend if but only if it verifies. I'm constantly pleasantly surprised in the wealth of knowledge displayed by posters (whatever method of forecasting used) on this forum and not just from the acknowledged experts. To all of you: Don't ever stop! Just like the NWP ensembles, the spread of those posters interpretation bounds the extremes between which the true synoptic outcome lays. For me, the question of weighting any given forecasters interpretation is a matter of credibiity based on the frequency of displayed skill at hitting the correct outcome - again by whatever method is used provided its not random luck. In that respect one could get a skewed result also from how many posts a given individual makes. Old school experience is hard to substitute especially when unusual (read unrecognised) synoptic patterns are thrown up. But even some of these interpretations can be swayed if emotion is allowed to bias judgement. Everyone (on this forum knows that all NWP - which includes the emerging science of Teleconnections - is based on the solid laws of old school physics heavily statistically extrapolated. Return to mild is not a question of 'if' but definitely 'when'. Spring and summer cannot be stopped any more than the earths' orbit around the sun. The teleconns for me in no way suggest an abrupt Atlantic dominated change. A gradual pattern change with a cool late winter into spring and then an unsettled period as insolation melts the continental snow fields. El Nino induced bbq summer must still be the odds-on favourite. Pattern recognition and pulling a signal from the noise should be a skill at which humans excel. NWP indicators are merely a tool no matter how complex the equations or computer software becomes lest the servant becomes the master. ffO. PS. I, Robot.