WEEKLY CLIMATE NEWS

11-15 September 2017

ITEMS OF INTEREST

A memorable portrait of three powerful Atlantic hurricanes from space -- A composite "day-night" band image obtained from data collected last Friday (8 September) by the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) mounted on the NOAA/NASA Suomi NPP (National Polar-orbiting Partnership) satellite shows three hurricanes spread across the tropical North Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico. This image is somewhat rare in the simultaneous and relatively close geographical occurrence of three hurricanes in the Atlantic basin (that includes the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea). Furthermore, two of the hurricanes, Irma and Jose, were identified to be major (category 3 or higher on the Saffir-Simpson Scale).
A 36-second animation video made from a sequence of images obtained from the NOAA GOES-East satellite also shows the three hurricanes over a three-day span.
In addition, a natural-color image made last Friday of Hurricane Irma from data obtained by the MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) instrument onboard NASA's Terra satellite shows a nearly textbook illustration of a major hurricane, as Irma, the most powerful Atlantic hurricane on record, was heading toward the southern coast of Florida; at the time of the image, Irma was a category 4 hurricane after reaching category 5 status. [NASA Earth Observatory]
September is National Preparedness Month -- The month of September has been declared National Preparedness Month (NPM), which aims to educate and empower Americans to prepare for and respond to all types of emergencies, including natural disasters. NPM is managed and sponsored by the Federal Emergency Management Administration's (FEMA) Ready Campaign in conjunction with the Ad Council, A toolkit of marketing materials is provided to help promote the month and represents the lead on this campaign that was originally launched in 2004. The overarching theme for 2017 NPM is "Disasters Don’t Plan Ahead. You Can.," with an emphasis on preparedness for youth, older adults, and people with disabilities and others with access and functional needs.
Week 2 of the 2017 NPM (10-16 September) has the theme "Plan to Help Your Neighbor and Community." [FEMA's Ready.gov]
Worldwide GLOBE at Night 2017 Campaign commences -- The ninth in a series of GLOBE at Night citizen-science campaigns for 2017 will commence this Tuesday (12 September) and continue through Thursday, 21 September. GLOBE at Night is a worldwide, hands-on science and education program designed to encourage citizen-scientists worldwide to record the brightness of their night sky by matching the appearance of a constellation (Cygnus in the Northern Hemisphere and Sagittarius in the Southern Hemisphere) with the seven magnitude/star charts of progressively fainter stars. Activity guides are also available. The GLOBE at night program is intended to raise public awareness of the impact of light pollution. The next series in the 2017 campaign is scheduled for 11-20 October 2017. [GLOBE at Night]
Celebrating preservation of Earth's ozone layer -- This Saturday, 16 September, has been designated by the United Nations as World Ozone Day, the International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer. This day is celebrated to mark the day back in 1987 when the Montreal Protocol was signed. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Montreal Protocol. [United Nations]
Monitoring the seasonal motions of the sun -- If you would like more background information concerning how the sun appears to across your local sky, along with the times of local sunrise and local sunset, for your hometown on any day throughout year, please read this week's Supplemental Information...In Greater Depth.

CLIMATE MONITORING

Smoke from western wildfires spread across nation -- A natural-color mosaic made from data collected by the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the NOAA/NASA Suomi NPP (National Polar-orbiting Partnership) satellite at the start of last week shows a smoky pall over a large section of the contiguous United States. The smoke from numerous wildfires that were burning across the western States and sections of western Canada was being carried eastward by winds from the west. A map of the contiguous US showing the Aerosol Index was generated from data obtained from another instrument on the Suomi NPP satellite, the Ozone Mapper Profiler Suite (OMPS). This map shows the largest concentrations of aerosols, or products of the wildfires, along a band from west to east across the nation paralleling the upper level winds. [NASA Earth Observatory]
The hot, dry summer across the West has helped create the widespread wildfires. A meteorologist with NOAA's Climate Prediction Center wrote an Event Tracker Blog. for Climate.gov that describes the dry conditions across the West, as shown by the map of drought conditions from a recent issue of the US Drought Monitor. [NOAA Climate.gov News]
Summer melt of Greenland ice sheet being mapped from the air -- NASA is making flights over Greenland as part of Operation IceBridge for four weeks between late August and late September in order to measure the amount of ice that has melted from the ice sheet during this past summer. These flight paths will repeat paths flown last spring in order to determine seasonal changes in ice sheet elevation. [NASA Earth Science News Team]
Evidence of "sea-level fingerprints" found from satellites -- Researchers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the University of California Irvine report finding evidence of sea level rise "fingerprints" that represent detectable patterns of sea-level variability from around the world due to changes in water storage on Earth's continents and in the mass of ice sheets for more than a decade (2003-2014). The researchers based their findings upon analysis of water mass change data from continental glaciers and land water storage data collected by NASA's GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) satellites. Melting of continental glaciers and ice sheets together with changes in water storage on the continents alert Earth's gravity field, which result in non-uniform changes in global sea level. [NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory Feature]

CLIMATE FORCING

Statement made on possible linkages between Hurricane Harvey and anthropogenic climate change --The World Meteorological Organization's (WMO) World Weather Research Programme Expert Team on Climate Impacts on Tropical Cyclones recently issued a statement concerning possible linkages between the category 4 Hurricane Harvey (on the Saffir-Simpson Scale) that generated widespread flooding along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast nearly two weeks ago and anthropogenic (human-generated) climate change. The report found "no clear evidence that climate change is making the occurrence of slowly moving land-falling hurricanes in the Houston region, such as Hurricane Harvey, more or less likely. However, some aspects or 'ingredients' of the Harvey event may have linkages to climate change." [ WMO News] (Editor's Note: WMO recently stated that some of the messages presented in their discussion of the possible linkages between Hurricane Harvey and anthropogenic climate change would also be pertinent to Hurricane Irma. EJH)
Contributions of deforestation to climate change have been overlooked for too long -- A team of researchers from Cornell and Princeton Universities, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the University of California Irvine recently published a report that shows deforestation and subsequent use of lands for agriculture or pasture contribute more to climate change than previously thought, especially in tropical regions. Their research indicates a 1.5 Celsius degree increase in global temperatures even if all fossil fuel emission were eliminated and if all current tropical deforestation rates were held steady through 2100. [Cornell University Media Relations Office]
Abrupt Southern Hemisphere climate changes near end of last ice age linked to massive Antarctic volcanic eruptions -- An international team of researchers recently reported that their high-resolution chemical measurements of Antarctic ice cores show a 192-year series of halogen-rich eruptions from the West Antarctic Mt. Takahe volcano appears to coincide with rapid climate change in the Southern Hemisphere approximately 17,700 years ago at the end of the most recent Pleistocene glaciation. The researchers concluded that stratospheric ozone depletion over Antarctica caused by increased halogen compounds from the eruptions triggered large-scale atmospheric and oceanic circulation changes that led to accelerated deglaciation. [Desert Research Institute News]
Dark colors of Arctic Ocean water are a major cause for polar sea retreat -- Scientists at Japan's Hokkaido University and the National Institute of Polar Research and at the University of Alaska Fairbanks have documented the crucial role that ice-ocean albedo (reflectivity) feedbacks play on the variation and long-term loss of Arctic Sea ice. Dark water surfaces with a lower albedo absorb more heat than white ice surfaces that have high albedo, thus melting ice and making more water surfaces in the Arctic Ocean. This relationship is a significant factor year to year in the ongoing seasonal loss of Arctic ice cover, which appears to be declining rapidly in the summer season. [Hokkaido University News]
Oceanic thunderstorms made more intense by ship exhaust -- In research conducted at the University of Washington, scientists have found that thunderstorms that develop over the major shipping lanes in the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea are significantly more powerful than thunderstorms over areas of the ocean not frequented by ships. These results were based upon the mapping of lightning data obtained from the World Wide Lightning Location Network, which showed that lightning strokes tended to occur nearly twice as often in these heavily traveled shipping lanes. The researchers concluded that aerosol particles emitted in ship exhaust were changing how storm clouds form over the ocean. [University of Washington News]

CLIMATE FORECASTS

Water supply across the West could be impacted by increases in wildfire-caused erosion -- A study made by the US Geological Survey (USGS) and in cooperation with several universities indicates that an increase in soil erosion rates within watersheds across the western United States can be expected due to the growing number of areas burned by wildfires. The acreage of wildfires was anticipated to expand during the first half of this century. The increased soil erosion rates should cause more sediment to be found in downstream rivers and reservoirs, which could negatively impact water supply and quality for some communities. [USGS News]

CLIMATE AND HUMAN HEALTH

Malaria risk zones in Ethiopian Highlands expand due to changing climate -- Researchers from the University of Maine and Columbia University recently reported that the malaria risk regions have expanded to higher elevations in the Ethiopian Highlands in the last 30 years as 10-day average minimum temperatures representing the critical threshold for malaria protection have increased during this time interval. Therefore, this topographic defense region to the deadly malaria disease provided by high-altitude plateaus and mountains in the Horn region in Northeast Africa appears to be fading due to a warming climate. [NOAA Climate.gov News]

CLIMATE AND SOCIETY

Earthweek -- Diary of the Planet [earthweek.com]

Concept of the Week: Developing a Quality Long-term Instrumental Climate Record

Systematic temperature and precipitation observations have been made at various locations across the nation for nearly two centuries. While only a handful of stations were available in the early 19th century, weather and climate observations currently are made from several hundred automatic weather sites operated by the National Weather Service and the Federal Aviation Administration as well as approximately 8000 stations in the Cooperative Observers Network administered by the National Weather Service. The weather data from these networks are also used to quantitatively assess changes of climate during the instrumental period of the past as well into the future. However, a variety of factors can affect the homogeneity of the record. For example, the locations of many of the stations have moved, from original downtown building roofs to current locations at airports. And the physical surroundings of the stations have changed, many becoming more urbanized.

In the late 1980s, the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC), the predecessor to the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), in conjunction with the US Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory created the United States Historical Climatology Network (USHCN) of 1218 stations across the 48 coterminous states having long-term records of both daily temperature and precipitation. This network was designed to provide an essential baseline data set for monitoring the nation's climate commencing in the late 19th century. These stations were created from a subset of the Cooperative Observers Network, chosen based upon long-term data quality that included length of record, percent of missing data, spatial distribution and number of station changes. Many of the selected USHCN stations were rural in an attempt to reduce the influence of urbanization. Using statistical analyses, data for these stations have been adjusted to account for movement of stations, or when a different thermometer type was installed. An urban warming correction was applied based upon population of the surrounding area.

More recently, NOAA began the US Climate Reference Network (USCRN), a project designed to collect and analyze climate data of the highest possible quality for the next 50 to 100 years. Each USCRN station would have electronic sensors that would make routine measurements of air temperature, precipitation, IR ground surface temperature, solar radiation and wind speed with a frequency of every five minutes and transmit these data to both NCDC and to National Weather Service offices via orbiting satellites on nearly a real-time basis. In addition to these measurements, additional sensors could be added to the USCRN stations that would measure soil temperature and soil moisture. Conscientious and detailed site selection was made for all stations so that they would not only be spatially representative, but that they would be in locations where the surrounding physical conditions would have a high likelihood of remaining the same over the next 50 to 100 years. Many of the sites were placed on federal or state owned lands, helping minimize the contamination of the climate record by urbanization or other changes in local ground cover.

These long-term, comparative, spatially representative values are vital to detect and verify the subtle changes in climatic conditions before they become overwhelmingly obvious.

Historical Events

11-12 September 1949...Early snowstorm dumped 7.5 inches on Helena, MT on the 11th, the earliest measurable snow for the city to date, then an additional 22 inches followed the next day. (The Weather Doctor)
11-12 September 1976...Japan's 24-hour rainfall record was set as 44.80 inches of rain fell at Hiso in Tokuhima Prefecture as a result of Typhoon Fran, which also was responsible for 167 deaths in Japan. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
11 September 1990...The high temperature at Phoenix, AZ reached 112, the highest ever for the date and for so late in the season. (Intellicast)
11 September 1992...With sustained winds of 145 mph and gusts to 175 mph, category 4 Hurricane Iniki pulverized Kauai. The central pressure central pressure was 27.91 inches of mercury. At the time, this hurricane was the worst storm in recorded history in Hawaii and one of the 10 worst in US history; it caused between $2 billion and $3 billion in damage. (National Weather Service files)
12 September 1987...Peak sustained winds in Hurricane Max reached 155 mph, the highest observed for an Eastern Pacific hurricane. (The Weather Doctor)
13 September 1922...The temperature at El Azizia in Libya soared to 136 degrees to establish a world record at a surface weather station. To make matters worse, a severe ghibi (dust storm) was in progress. (The Weather Channel) (NCDC) [Note: In September 2012, a World Meteorological Organization panel disqualified this world record temperature due to errors made in recording the temperature at that location. The currently recognized world record high temperature is 134 degrees made at Greenland Ranch in Death Valley, CA on 10 July 1913.]
13 September 1988...Hurricane Gilbert smashed into the Cayman Islands, and as it headed for the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico strengthened into a monster hurricane, packing winds of 175 mph. The barometric pressure at the center of Gilbert reached 26.13 inches (888 mb), an all-time record for any hurricane in the Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico, or the Atlantic Ocean. Gilbert covered much of the Gulf of Mexico, producing rain as far away as the Florida Keys. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
14 September 1937...The mercury soared to 92 degrees at Seattle, WA, a record for September. (The Weather Channel)
14 September 1970...The temperature at Fremont, OR dipped to 2 degrees above zero to equal the state record for September set on the 24th in 1926. (The Weather Channel)
14 September 1987...Barrow, AK received 5.1 inches of snow, a record for September. (Sandra and TI Richard Sanders - 1987)
14 September 1988...Pressure in the eye of Hurricane Gilbert moving across the Caribbean Sea fell to 885 millibars (26.17 inches of mercury), the lowest recorded barometric pressure in the Western Hemisphere. Ultimately, 318 died in seven countries across the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico.
15 September 1939...The temperature at Detroit, MI soared to 100 degrees to establish a record for September. (The Weather Channel)
15 September 1982...A snowstorm over Wyoming produced 16.9 inches at Lander to establish a 24-hour record for September for that location. (13th-15th) (The Weather Channel)
16 September 1881...Iowa's earliest measurable snow of record fell over western sections of the state. Four to six inches were reported between Stuart and Avoca. (The Weather Channel)
16 September 1964...The temperature at Concord, NH dropped to 27 degrees ending the shortest growing season on record (100 days). (Intellicast)
16 September 1988...Hurricane Gilbert made landfall 120 miles south of Brownsville, TX in Mexico during the early evening. During its life span, Gilbert established an all-time record for the Western Hemisphere with a sea-level barometric pressure reading of 26.13 inches. Winds approached 200 mph, with higher gusts. Gilbert devastated Jamaica and Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data) (The Weather Channel)
16 September 2004, Birmingham, Alabama: Birmingham, AL set two all-time records for the city as Hurricane Jeanne crossed the city: Lowest sea level pressure on record, 986.8 millibars (29.14 inches of mercury), and the greatest 24-hour rainfall event on record, 9.75 inches. (The Weather Doctor)
17 September 1829...The Siebold Typhoon, Japan's most catastrophic typhoon, inflicted widespread damage over much of Japan. On the southern island of Kyushu, the storm surge off the Ariake Sea kills 10,000. (The Weather Doctor)
17 September 1932...Westerly, RI received 12.13 inches of rain, which set a 24-hour precipitation record for the state. (NCDC)
17 September 1963...Nearly 2.5 inches of rain fell in 24 hours, the most intense rain for Yuma, AZ during the period between 1909 and 1977. (The Weather Doctor)

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