The Wichita Eagle  is reporting that Chris Klieman is retiring and that he will be replaced by Collin Klein. There is a press conference schedule for 4pm today. 

Krusty is Korrect, as always! You can find my book here . A book is a great Christmas gift.  It is the 17th best selling book about weather of all time. It is an uplifting story -- gripping at time -- of how courageous meteorologists fought the bureaucracy and other obstacles to create today's storm warning system that saves so many lives. 

Above is a video of the chaos on the roads during the major winter storm Thanksgiving weekend. My question is, WHY?! The forecasts -- for more than a foot of snow with near blizzard conditions in places -- were out for two days before the storm. It was recommended to leave early and beat the storm or delay and wait until the storm was over (my nephew left a day early -- Friday -- and had no problems). Obviously, many did not. Why?!  ~ 4" of snow fell in the Kansas City area today and the roads were absolutely terrible, even though the forecast was excellent. The road departments obviously did not believe the forecasts . Why?! Fox4 Kansas City. Compare to forecast at the purple link. Returning to the weekend snow, below is a reproduction of the forecast on this blog posted ~ 4:30pm Thanksgiving afternoon. Plenty of time to make a change in plans before the storm. The information is specific and actionable. If anyone wishes to opine as to why so many ignored the forecasts, please ...

Why are we paying women to be single and poor? A succinct and thoughtful piece is here . Highly recommended. 

Winter Weather Advisories and Warnings Purple = winter weather advisory. Pink = winter weather warning.  Winterized Radar as of 4:33pm CST Below is the forecast additional  snow from now to 9am CST Tuesday.

As of 7am Monday, the radar should look something like this with an area of snow developing in Kansas and mixed precipitation in Arkansas. The area affected by snow will grow in size during the day and it will move east.  Forecast radar for 7am Monday Below is the forecast snow accumulations. The snow should move out of the the areas west of the Mississippi River by midnight and out of the region by Tuesday morning.  Note that there will be heavy lake effect snows east and southeast of Lake Michigan.  The map below is NOAA's satellite-derived snow depth product as of midnight. The amounts in inches are depicted as the upper row of numbers on the scale.  The forecasts for this first major snow of the season were exceptionally good. Congratulations to the NWS and the meteorologists throughout the region! Given the large volume of post-Thanksgiving travel, it was important to get this one correct. 

Read this, please. I'm not aware of of "East Coast beaches" that disappeared five years ago.  It doesn't matter if it is sea level rise, snow (" a thing of the past "), this year's hurricane season for the United States, or some "tipping point," the fact that these forecasts were radically wrong never pierces their conviction that doom is just around the corner. This is most certainly not  how science works. Science works by making testable predictions that others can also reproduce and observe. 

Here's the latest regional radar as of 2:45pm. There are delays of five hours at O'Hare. Midway has a complete ground stop.  The snow gaps you see in Iowa and northeast Missouri are due to gaps in the radar network. It is snowing there, too.  Forecast radar for 7pm. Pink represents a winter storm warning. Purple is a winter weather advisory. Sand is a wind advisory. 

Here is a complete update on the brutal winter storm that will move across the Midwest this weekend. The only good aspect is much of this area needs precipitation.  Freezing Rain The orange and red areas and, too a lesser extent the yellow, will have slippery road conditions due to icy conditions. Please factor this into your travel plans. Heavy Snow Forecast It will be windy throughout the area where the heaviest shows are forecast to fall, so travel will be difficult to impossible. In addition, there will be major delays at O'Hare, Midway, and some delays in Detroit. American Airlines, Delta and jetBlue are grounding some planes due to a software update . I would check your airline's website plus the FAA's website before heading for the airport. If it were me, I would call  reservations and request to be routed around the storm -- that is, instead of changing planes at O'Hare, see if it would be possible to do so in Charlotte, Dallas, or Philadelphia. Call them now. ...

Pink = winter storm warning. Dark green = winter storm watch. Purple = winter weather advisory.  I'll have a complete update on the winter storm this afternoon. 

I hope your Thanksgiving was as nice as ours. Here is an update on the winter storm that will affect post-Thanksgiving travel. Pink = winter storm warning. Dark green = winter storm watch. Purple = winter weather advisory.  It is possible on Saturday that near blizzard conditions will occur in southeast Iowa and Illinois. This is reflected in the NWS's "impact chart." Here are snowfall amounts to 1am Monday: Below is the forecast radar for 9am Saturday. Note that O'Hare and Midway will be affected. 

So said Les Nessman during the world's most famous turkey drop . Fortunately, we've learned a lot since 1978. If you'd like to see a genuine pumpkin drop, click here . 

Here is a map of current warnings and advisories for Wednesday: Orange: blizzard warning Pink: winter storm warning Purple: winter weather advisory Gold: high wind warning Sand; wind advisory Please do not attempt to travel through the blizzard region. Wait until the storm subsides. 

Tornado watch until 6pm.  -- forecast for tornadoes until 7am Wednesday -- The area in brown has a significant chance of tornadoes after 7am CST on Tuesday. Please monitor the weather in these areas. 

Issued 11:40pm Monday Red outline is a tornado watch until 7am for eastern Louisiana and much of Mississippi.  Issued 6:45pm Monday A new tornado watch has been issued for parts of southeast Texas and western Louisiana until 1am CST Tuesday.  Tornado in the Houston Metro Monday Afternoon Note the lofted debris under the funnel cloud. At one point 27,000 homes and businesses were without power. More than 100 homes were damaged. No serious injuries have been reported.  Tornado watch continues.... Tornado watch in effect until 7pm for southeast Texas, including Houston, and a small part of northwest Louisiana. The tornado threat is forecast to evolve east across Louisiana and into Mississippi into tonight.  Please monitor the weather in these areas!

Bear with me while I provide a little background information..... In the 1960's, Dr. Stan Changnon of the Illinois State Water Survey noticed that a volunteer weather station downwind of Chicago reported far more precipitation, especially snow, than other weather stations in the area. This unusual weather condition was called the "LaPorte (Indiana) Weather Anomaly" and it lasted from the 1930's to the 1960's. He believed it was caused by air pollution from Chicago increasing the amount of precipitation downwind of the city.  Like so many discoveries in weather science, it caused a great deal of controversy even though the data was solid. Dozens of articles and commentary articles were written.  Via Grok, tiny sample of papers on this topic. To help determine whether cities could actually modify the weather near and downwind of their location, the "Metromex" project in St. Louis was established from 1971 to 1975.  Metromex clearly showed an increase in ra...

For travelers, here is the forecast snowfall from now until 6pm Wednesday evening. 

There is a risk of a tornado or two along with severe thunderstorms in southwest Texas until 10pm Sunday. 

It must be because of the climate meeting now going on in Brazil that odd climate claims are on full display this week. From Time  magazine: The fire was caused by arson  and below is the person who is being held in prison for it. Arson has nothing to do with climate change!   This morning, a meteorologist I respect wrote about the catastrophic July 4 Texas flash floods and included this unfortunate sentence : That, of course, also assumes that we are living in a stable climate — which we are not. Below is a yearly plot of earth's ocean/land temperature (HADCrut5) which is generally accepted as a valid measure of temperature by the climate community. As "climate" is defined by the UN's IPCC as a minimum 30 year period, do you see a period where the temperatures are "stable" (flat) for 30 or more years? Of course not.  The following are facts . The worst storms in history (by intensity, not loss of life) in the contiguous United States were about 100 years ag...