While some of the rain in this storm system can be attributed to upper-air moisture brought along by the hurricane, Ike itself isn't due to arrive in Illinois until tomorrow. No doubt there will be even more heavy rain then. Wow.

Click to enlarge.

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Fucking rock on. This is what I love about Midwest weather. We were flashed and boomed most satisfyingly when this rolled through.


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Rain! I hope the basement isn't flooded.

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Today is the first day where the sun is in the sky more than 50% of the day. This happens before the equinox because of refraction effects of the earth's atmosphere and, I suppose, because the sun is not a point source of light.

That and seeing Sirius so far to the west in the night sky are my first firm signs of spring and the promise that despite ( Read more... )

We came in today to find that our big wireless distribution tower on the south campus had toppled in yesterday's storm. There wasn't a lot of wind associated with the storm, though, so we're thinking some kind of structural failure and/or install problem.

What's funny is that our current set of wireless links are all still showing green on our ( Read more... )

Well, they have predicted us to be right in the middle of the heaviest band of snow from the approaching winter storm, with up to 12 inches of snow to fall overnight.

I'm starting to lose track of all this. It was really cold, then it got up into the 50's, then we had a thunderstorm with 60-knot winds that dropped the temperature by 15 degrees in ( Read more... )

Around 1pm today it was 54 degrees. Then the front came through; after five minutes of intense rain, thunder, and wind, it was suddenly 40 degrees. A weather statement noted, in rather blasé fashion, "A TORNADO IS POSSIBLE UNTIL 7PM."

Now the wind is blowing even harder and it's down to 9 degrees, creating a wind chill factor of -17. It's supposed ( Read more... )

Well, the clear solid ice has all long-since melted and we're about to replace it with the white fluffier kind, but disruptive as it was, the ice storm left us with some pretty scenery.

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Fine weather for the day before Thanksgiving.

METAR KCMI 211753Z 02014KT 1 1/4SM +TSRA BR BKN007 OVC011 07/07 A2980 RMK AO2 LTG DSNT SW AND W TSB36 SLP093

I was out in the driveway very late last night when the sky lit up with a burst of lightning. Later, in bed, I heard much rumbling of thunder and a brief burst of rain. And when I woke up very early this morning, when it was barely light out, there was more thunder and rain. It almost made me believe that I'd slept through an unpleasant winter and ( Read more... )