Easy Target, But I Love How This TV Meteorologist Destroys Flat Earthers

TV Meteorologist Keith Carson has had it with the Flat-Earthers. 

Apparently, believing that the Earth is flat, not round is the latest Big Thing.

Meteorologist Keith Carson of television stations WCSH and WLBZ in Maine, recently went off for five minutes on why the Flat Earthers are wrong. The YouTube video of Carson's rant went viral.

At first, you wonder why Carson would go after such a weird, unsustainable theory like "the Earth is flat."

But it looks like he decided just to have fun, plus he objects to the Flat Earthers raising money from the gullible, money that could go for more worthwhile things like cancer research. The rapper B.o.B, for instance, is trying to raise money to launch rockets that he said would "prove" the Earth is flat.

Alrighty, then.

Carson starts with the fact there are zillions of photos taken from space that show a round Earth. All fake, say the flat earthers. By the way, they don't have a solid conspiracy theory that the government is trying to hide the "fact that the Earth is flat, Carson points out.

It's just that - this is convoluted, as these things are - this round Earth idea is to try to make people used to and enthusiastically support space travel while the government tries to militarize space, or something like that.

And the flat earthers don't blame NASA. They just think the fine folks at NASA are simply unaware the Earth is flat. Or as Carson snarkily puts it: "Poor NASA. So clueless."

Carson concludes his piece: "Find the edge of the Earth, lean backwards ad prove to me that gravity is just another big lie."

Here's Carson's video. Totally worth the view:

Heads Ups: Could Be Messy Travel Heading Into Next Christmas Weekend

I don't know if Christmas weekend travel will be as dicey as
in this photo, but there is a definitely potential for wintry storms
in Vermont and surrounding areas Friday through Christmas Day.

Christmas is a week from Monday already, and it's time to start traveling to visit friends and relatives. My husband flew off to South Dakota this morning. Luckily, there's no major weather issues in his flight path, so that's good.

Many of the rest of us won't be so lucky. It's looking rather stormy, especially in the eastern part of the country, as we head toward next weekend.

I'll mainly focus on here in Vermont and surrounding areas, at least at first. Expect some pretty big swings in temperatures and weather conditions all week as you finish your Christmas shopping and get set to travel.

It was certainly cold as heck this Sunday morning, as temperatures across most of the region dropped below zero again - the second time in a week that's happened.

It'll be a little better this afternoon - teens to around 20 - before other big changes come. It'll continue warming up Monday. That'll come with a price. It always does. There will be some snow showers around, maybe even some freezing drizzle as we keep warming well into the 20s.

Tuesday brings a brief thaw, with temperatures around 40, with showers. And some wet snow in the mountains. So it'll get sloppy and slushy.

Then another cold front comes through by Wednesday morning. It'll get pretty cold again, and Tuesday's slush will turn into sheets of ice. And crusty snow. Watch out under foot. It'll be slip and slide weather for you pedestrians Wednesday and Thursday. Roads could be kinda slippery Wednesday morning, too.

From there, big changes come again. Another storm system is expected to arrive Friday and Saturday. At this point, it looks like a warm one, at least around here. That probably means snow to icy precipitation to rain and back to snow at the end. This storm is nearly a week away, so it's hard to tell exactly what it's going to do. Stay tuned for updates, but what I've described looks like the scenario at this point.

Along the East Coast, it looks like there will be rain, with a fair amount of snow in the Great Lakes region. This storm should be over for almost everyone by Saturday afternoon and evening. However, some indications are that another storm could spread coastal rain and inland snow across the Northeast on Christmas Day.

There's even a chance it could be a fairly substantial snow. But looking at things eight days in advance, it's very hard to tell if that scenario will play out or not.  Could be a bust. Don't count on that storm yet, for sure. We'll see how it turns out.

It also looks like a very strong cold snap will begin to invade the Northern Plains and Great Lakes next weekend, and intensify on Christmas a few days thereafter. That very cold air will probably reach the Northeast after that maybe storm on Christmas. It's definitely looking like a very active weather pattern through the end of the year, and possibly into the beginning of 2018.

Scientists Pin Extreme 2016 Weather Specifically On Climate Change

This severe 2016 flood in China was one of many extreme
weather events that year made worse by climate change

For many years now, scientists have always told us it's really hard to pin a specific extreme weather event on climate change. Global warming just makes those wacky weather moments more likely.

Now, those scientists are getting better at saying certain weather extremes can be definitively linked to climate change. And they're pointing to some weird weather in 2016 as examples.

A peer-reviewed report called "Explaining Extreme Events in 2016 From A Climate Perspective" that takes a serious look at this very phenomenon. It was published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.

"For years, scientists have known humans are changing the risk of some extremes. But finding multiple extreme events that weren't even possible without human influence makes clear that we're experiencing new wather, because we've made a new climate," said Jeff Rosenfeld, editor-in-chief of the AMS Bulletin.

The report said 116 scientists from 18 countries looked at nearly two dozen extreme weather events across the globe that happened in 2016.

The planet had its hottest overall year in modern times during 2016, and that was the biggest weather news the scientists studied from that year. In terms of specific weather events, some of those cited in the report you might have heard of. Others were more obscure and esoteric, but would have big effects on people living near where they occured. Or even beyond the local impact.

One intriguing weather event the scientists looked at was extreme heat in Southeast Asia during 2016. There was an El Nino weather pattern in 2015 and early 2016. That pattern does tend to increase heat in Southeast Asia, whether or not global warming is a factor.

The report concluded: "The 2016 extreme warmth across Asia would not have been possible without climate change.... Although El Nino was expected to warm Southeast Asia in 2016, the heat in the region was unusually widespread."

The report continues: "All of the risk of extremely high temperatures over Asia in 2016 can be attributed to anthropogenic (human caused) warming. In addition, the ENSO condition (El Nino) ae te extreme warmth two times likely to occur."

Two of the esoteric events the scientists cited were weird ocean warming in the Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska near Alaska, and around the Great Barrier Reef in Australia.

Like the Southeast Asian heat, natural variability played a role in the ocean warmth near Alaska and Australia.  But the natural variability combined with climate change made the warmth unprecented. Why should we care about a warm Bering Sea? For one thing, it caused algae blooms, marine die-offs and contributed to a lack of Arctic ice. That damaged fisheries, and worse, a lack of ice in the Arctic might be messing with weather patterns, affecting, you, me and the rest of us in the Northern Hemisphere.

Of course, not all extreme weather events from 2016 are attributable to climate change. The study noted a big blizzard in the Mid-Atlantic States and a drought in Brazil that year were just random weather events, with little if any input from climate change.

Bob Henson in his Weather Underground Category 6 blog cited another study, which was actually a review of a number of studies that looked into weather particular extreme weather events are attributable to climate change.

Henson wrote that the analysis publishe by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, a non profit grou that focuses on climate change "looked at 59 extreme weather/climate change attribution studies published in the two years since the Paris Climate Accord in 2015. The analysis found that 41 of the studies demonstrated that climate change had made extreme weather events more intense and/or longer lived, and that a few of them had costs and death tolls that could be partially attributed to human-caused climate change."

I'm sure there will be a lot more science coming as researchers peer into more and more individual weather events to see ever more precisely how climate change is affecting us, or more often, screwing us over

Polish "Snow Devil" Impresses Hikers

A rare "snow devil" spun through a Polish
national forest recentlh. 

We often see snow blowing in swirls on gusty winter days, but rarely are they sustained like the video in this post.

A man named Michal Bielas was walking throug the Tatra National Park in Poland recently when he came across this impressive "snow devil" spinning through the edges of the forest. A snow devil is basically a dust devil. Just with snow substituted.

Snow devils are much more rare than dust devils. Usually these spinning columns of air need strong sun to heat the ground, causing air to rise, then cool air to swoop in and replace the rising warm air, and a breeze to get things spinning.

It's a lot harder to get the ground warmed up when it's snow covered. Snow reflects the sun's heat. But apparently, in this Polish forest, there was enough rising air, enough of a breeze to get a nice rotation going.  It looks like strong winds hit a steep slope, helping to get the air rotating into the snow devil.

Which means we ended up with this cool viral weather video:

California Wildfires, Unbelievably For December, Still Raging. Baked Alaska, Too

A home burns in northern San Diego County, California
earlier this week as flames continue to spread through
the region. In December! 

The wildfires this month in California aren't at the top of the headlines as much anymore, but they are still raging, which is incredible for December, which is supposed to be well within the state's rainy season.

Judging from the southern California weather forecasts for the next few days, the fires might leap back into homes, and the front pages of newspapers and home pages of news web sites.

It remains bone dry in Southern California. No rain is in sight, at least until after Christmas. Offshore winds blowing in from the east are keeping the relative humidity extremely low. And the Santa Ana winds are resurgent, blowing strong again today. They'll continue to gust off and on through Saturday, and could pick up to become very, very dangerous again on Sunday.

The Thomas Fire, the one that burned hundreds of homes in and around Ventura, California once it started on December 4 continues to burn with no end in sight.  It is 30 percent contained, but who knows if it will break fire lines in this weather? Plus, there's a high risk that new fires could break out, even if a fire in northern San Diego County that destroyed 157 homes is largely contained. So is the one in BelAir.

As Reuters reports, the Thomas Fire is California's fifth largest wildfire on record. It has destroyed more than 700 homes, traveled 27 miles and charred 371 square miles, an area larger than New York City. The fire continues to spread, and belch choking smoke through the region. That continues to raise health concerns.

That we are still talking about dangerous wildfire conditions across southern California heading into Christmas is just incredible. Santa Ana winds do still blow fairly frequently in this region in December and even January, but by now, it has normally rained so much that the winds don't spark any major fires. At this time of year, southern Californians should be worried about heavy rains and mudslides, not wildfires.

Not this time.

This wildfire bizarro world in California is not entirely caused by climate change, but climate change has its fingerprints all over the situation. We're in a La Nina weather pattern, which does favor dryness in the Southwest. La Ninas come and go with or without climate change, so there's that.

People also keep building more and more houses in areas that are fire prone, so as long as that trend continues, wildfires will get more and more destructive, with or without climate change.

But the persistence of the dryness and accompanying intense warmth for this time of year is a hallmark of climate change. As the Los Angeles Times reports, California Governor Jerry Brown said climate change has brought his state into a new normal, one in which out of season wildfires like the current ones are becoming more common. He says the situation will worsen, saying that climate change has us "on the road to hell."

Southern California isn't the only place that has gotten weird, unprecedented December wildfires. A wildfire earlier this week in and near Custer State Park, not far from Rapid City, South Dakota, forced evacuations.

A bit odd for a northern state like South Dakota in December, don't you think?

Then let's look at Alaska recently. Nope, no wildfires going on there at the moment. But Anchorage earlier this week had four consecutive days with highs of 45 degrees or more, the first time that's happened in December. In the southeastern Alaska town of Sitka, the overnight low temperture was 53 degrees on December 7. That was one degree warmer than the record high temperature for the date.

Each day since December 3 in normally ultra frigid Fairbanks, Alaska has been at least 18 degrees above normal. November in Barrow, on the northern tip of Alaska, was a whopping 16.4 degrees warmer than normal, by far a record. There's still open water on the northwest coast of Alaska. It should have been locked in frozen well before now.

A weather pattern that makes winter weather unusually warm in Alaska usually means frigid weather in the eastern United States, including here in Vermont. Yes, it's been cold the past couple of days, with temperatures around zero this morning.

However, zero degrees in a Vermont December is nothing unusual. And overall temperatures so far this December are so far running near normal. The weather pattern since the beginning of the month should have kept us well below normal.

This blog post turned into a climate change rant, I get it. But I think it's something we all must get off our chests now and then. It's that important.

Average Snow Doesn't Faze Vermont, And Epic Snows Don't Faze Buffalo Bills Fans.

Buffalo Bills fans "enjoy" their hometown team
winning during heavy lake effect snow squalls last Sunday

In case you haven't noticed, if you've gone outdoors to do anything in the past week or so, there's a good chance you encountered either falling snow or snow on the ground. Tis the season, right?  

The snowfall in Vermont had wound down this afternoon, though as of 3:30 p.m., there is still some steady snow falling along the immediate western slopes of the Green Mountains, and flurries elsewhere.

As expected, the western slopes made up for the lack of snow yesterday with a decent thumping this morning, with eight or nine inches of total snow along the western slopes of the Greens, with higher amounts.

And those eight inch reports came while it was still snowing at midmorning.

A couple places picked up a fairly impressive storm total, though overall this Vermont snow was pretty run of the mill by our standards.

Killington did pick up 19 inches of snow, and Rochester, Vermont had just a hair under 17 inches of fresh powder. Pomfret came up with a little under 16 inches of new snow.

It's damn nippy out there with the northwest breeze, and wind chills are near or just below zero. Actual temperatures will flirt with zero tonight.

Still, if you're brave enough, go outside and see if you can view the Geminid Meteor Shower. There will likely be a LOT of shooting stars, assuming the sky clears up enough where you are to see them. It will be a frigid view, but perhaps worth it. The best chance for relatively clear skies tonight in Vermont are between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m.

Bit tough to see the action amid Lake Erie
snow squalls during the NFL's Buffalo
Bills home game last Sunday.

The snow we got, and the cold we're getting, is pretty routine for a Vermont December. So, too, was a snow blitz during last Sunday's NFL Buffalo Bills home game as torrents of snow poured off of Lake Erie.

Last Sunday, fans of the NFL's Buffalo Bills really got into the snow.

Those heavy snow squalls blew in off Lake Erie and smothered the stadium in snow during Sunday's game.

According to the Buffalo Bills website, eight inches of snow fell during the game, between 12:30 and 4 p.m. About 20 snow blowers were deployed during the game so players and everyone else could see sidelines, yard markers and hashmaks on the field.

In the end, it seemed not too many people minded the snow, since Buffalo ultimately won the game in overtime.

Here's one video scene from the snowy NFL game:



And here are a bunch of Buffalo Bills fans totally unfazed by the heavy snow:

It's Now Time For Vermont's Western Slopes, Ski Areas To Get The Big Snow

Web cam shot taken shortly after 8 a.m. this morning shows
snow redeveloping and falling in the Nashville section of
Jericho, Vermont, along the western slopes of the Green
Mountains. The western slopes and the northern Green
Mountain peaks will get the most additional accumulation today.

As forecasted yesterday, the last phase of our North Country mid-December snowfall is shifting its focus to Vermont's Green Mountains and the western slopes of those mountains.

It took just awhile for that situation to develop. We did know there would be a late night lull in the snow regionwide, and that has happened. It actually stopped snow in the Champlain Valley.

Now, as of 8 a.m. Wednesday the west and northwest gusts have redeveloped, and the snow has reblossomed, especially along those western slopes. As expected, that snow has backed westward into the Champlain Valley, so it's snowing in places like Burlington and St. Albans again.

Expect this to continue through most of the morning, before the falling snow gradually retreats to end up just on the western slopes and the summits.

There might be a couple more inches of snow in the Champlain Valley this morning, and several more inches in the Green Mountains. I still think places like the top of Mount Mansfield and Jay Peak will end up with a storm total of 18 inches or so.

Only light snows will hit the southern Green Mountains, but they had their turn yesterday, especially on the eastern slopes and the summits down there.  There were some fairly impressive totals in the central and southern Greens. 

Some examples include 14 inches in Andover, 13 inches in Wallingford, and 12 inches in West Bridgewater and Hancock. I'm sure we'll see some updates with sizeable storm totals over northern Vermont before the day is out.

Pretty heavy snows will continue in much of the northern third of New Hampshire and northwestern Maine today, too. Heavy lake effect snow bands are also cranking in western New York and other areas near the Great Lakes, too.

It's much colder than it was yesterday region wide, and it's not going to get any warmer. Expect temperatures in the teens to around 20 today with nasty wind chills. That state of affairs will continue through Thursday, but by Thursday there will only be flurries at most in most areas.

Bottom line: In case you haven't noticed already, the roads across much of Vermont and surrounding areas are still slick. That will continue to be a problem during the late afternoon commute, especially near and just west of the Green Mountains.

Small disturbances will cause bouts of light precipitation from this weekend onward into next week, but it is still hard to tease out exactly when and how much snow or something else will come down. It will turn warmer again at the start of next week, with high temperatures in the valleys even getting above freezing during the afternoons.

At least that warming trend will make the snow great for snowball fights.