The weather has cooled off a bit in the interior of Alaska:
Friday marked day six of the worst cold snap to hit Fairbanks in several years and there is no relief in sight for residents who live in Alaska’s second-largest city — or the business owners they call to bail them out when their cars, pipes and septic tanks freeze.
The temperature in North Pole dipped to 55 degrees below zero on Wednesday night, the lowest temperature recorded in the greater Fairbanks area during what has been six days of severe cold. It was “only” 46 below at 4 p.m. Friday in North Pole, but the temperature was “dropping by the hour,” meteorologist Austin Cross at the National Weather Service in Fairbanks said.
Friday marked the fifth day in the last six the temperature at Fairbanks International Airport hit 40 below or colder; it was only 38 below at the airport on New Year’s Day.
Forecasters expect temperatures in Fairbanks this weekend will likely touch 50 below and there is no indication the cold wave will dissipate anytime soon.
Since I don't read Alaskan newspapers often, and I'm used to seeing cold Alaskan temperatures on the Weather Now extremes page, I actually first heard this when ten people emailed me to complain about a bug in Weather Now. It turns out, the news story above linked to Weather Now and drove 2,400 unique visitors to the site in six hours.
I should know better. Fortunately my servers easily handle 10,000 page views per hour, but still, seeing a traffic spike like that caught me a little off-guard.
Apparently their forests aren't working:
The country's 1.2 million square miles of trees have been dubbed the "lungs of the planet" by ecologists because they account for more than 7 percent of Earth's total forest lands. They could always be depended upon to suck in vast quantities of carbon dioxide, naturally cleansing the world of much of the harmful heat-trapping gas.
But not anymore.
In an alarming yet little-noticed series of recent studies, scientists have concluded that Canada's precious forests, stressed from damage caused by global warming, insect infestations and persistent fires, have crossed an ominous line and are now pumping out more climate-changing carbon dioxide than they are sequestering.
In other good news, Chicago had its wettest year on record in 2008, 1292 mm, beating the old record by more than 25 mm. The rain rain rain came down...
Turns out, 2008 will be one of the longest years ever when astronomers insert an extra second at 17:59:60 CT tonight:
The additional second makes up for the difference in two clocks – one based on Earth’s rotation and the other on the more precise atomic time of the UTC.
In the U.S., the extra second will be added by the U.S. Naval Observatory at 6:59:59 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (11:59:59 p.m. Universal time). It will be the 24th "leap second" tacked on to the universal time scale since 1972.
The popular press have written about this as prolonging the gloom of 2008. I don't know if that's accurate. People familiar with the structure of fiction will notice that although we had the technical climax of our present story on November 4th, the dramatic climax hasn't happened yet. I have no idea what that will look like, only that we'll probably see it in 2009, and the dénoument that follows will make us wax nostialgic about the halcyon days of 2008. Put another way: There is a tide; when you're in the trough of a wave, things don't really feel better until you've climbed halfway to the next crest.
I'm not trying to depress anyone. I just think we've got some difficult times ahead, for the simple reason that the worst really is behind us.
Enjoy the extra second.
Can you believe I gave up this:
For this:
This sign made me think twice. It doesn't look like they have lots of anything:
Especially when you're not at home and you get to read about it:
The National Weather Service had issued a tornado watch earlier today for much of northeasten Illinois, but cancelled it as of 3:10 p.m. The watch is still in effect for Lake and Will counties in Illinois and Jasper, Lake, Newton and Porter counties in Indiana until 7 p.m. tonight. The agency says hail up to 1 inch in diameter, with wind gusts up to 60 m.p.h., could be part of the storm that affects the area. A tornado watch means conditions are favorable for tornadoes and severe thunderstorms.
Oddly, though, it was warmer in Chicago today (15°C) than in San Francisco (12°C). Still, I'm happy to be here and not home while all that is going on.
So, never mind the worst housing news in a generation, the coming impeachment of our governor by his own party, and another sports team preparing to break our hearts, we have gotten both kinds of lovely weather in the past two days, with more coming:
THIS HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK IS FOR PORTIONS OF NORTH CENTRAL ILLINOIS...NORTHEAST ILLINOIS AND NORTHWEST INDIANA.
.DAY ONE...THIS AFTERNOON AND TONIGHT.
SNOW WILL CONTINUE TO FALL OFF AND ON THROUGH WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON. THE SNOW WILL MIX WITH SLEET SOUTH OF U.S. 24 THIS AFTERNOON WITH SLEET AND FREEZING RAIN GRADUALLY SPREADING NORTHWARD TONIGHT... SNOW AND SLEET MIXING WITH OR CHANGING TO FREEZING RAIN WILL POSSIBLY REACH AS FAR NORTH AS THE NORTH SHORE AND NORTHWEST CHICAGO SUBURBS AND DEKALB BY DAYBREAK WEDNESDAY MORNING. TOTAL SNOW AND SLEET ACCUMULATIONS BY DAYBREAK WEDNESDAY MORNING WILL RANGE FROM 2 INCHES SOUTH OF U.S. 24 TO NEAR 6 INCHES IN FAR NORTHERN ILLINOIS.
ALSO...ICE JAM RIVER FLOODING WILL REMAIN POSSIBLE THROUGH TONIGHT...PARTICULARLY ON THE KANKAKEE...FOX...ROCK...AND KISHWAUKEE RIVERS.
.DAYS TWO THROUGH SEVEN...WEDNESDAY THROUGH MONDAY.
SNOW WILL CONTINUE ACROSS NORTH CENTRAL AND FAR NORTHEAST ILLINOIS WEDNESDAY MORNING...WITH MIXED SNOW...SLEET...AND FREEZING RAIN ACROSS THE CHICAGO METRO AREA SOUTHWEST TOWARD PEORIA.
It's not as bad as it seems; the National Weather Service always shouts like that. But it does make one think, which is worse: -20°C, or 15 cm of snow? I'll let you know after I experience the joy of O'Hare tomorrow.
...the temperature goes from -20°C all the way to -16°C and you feel warmer.
I'm going to San Francisco later this week—a place about which Mark Twain said "The coldest winter I ever experienced was a summer [there]"—and I'm looking forward to the weather.
Despite the snow covering Chicago for the past few days, winter officially began with the solstice this morning at 6:04. To celebrate, the weather changed overnight. I forgot what -21°C felt like until taking Parker out a few minutes ago. Even he wanted to go right back inside.
In Chicago, we say our weather builds character. I'm starting to think, maybe I have enough.
I forgot to mention the wind chill: -35°C with 34-knot winds. Yummy.
Update: On our noon walk, poor Parker made it half a block before his paws started to hurt. He likes cool weather, but even this dog, with his double fur coat, has his limits.
Today's National Weather Service forecast:
Today: A 40 percent chance of snow, mainly after 3pm. Cloudy, with a high near 28. Calm wind becoming southeast around 5 mph.
Tonight: Snow and sleet, becoming all snow after midnight. The snow could be heavy at times. Temperature rising to around 31 by 4am. Breezy, with a east southeast wind 5 to 10 mph increasing to between 15 and 20 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. Little or no snow accumulation expected.
Friday: Snow and sleet, becoming all snow after 9am. High near 33. Breezy, with a northeast wind between 15 and 20 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. Little or no snow accumulation expected.
Continuous updates on my other site.
It's a little thing, but it means our evenings won't seem as gloomy from now on: tonight's sunset in Chicago is the earliest of the year. Seriously. It has to do with the speed of the earth's orbit around the sun this time of year (it's faster, as we approach perihelion).
In any event, tomorrow night the sun sets just a few seconds later than it does tonight, which just adds a little happiness this time of year.