Updraft: January 5, 2009 Archive

Humbled

Posted at 7:07 AM on January 5, 2009 by Craig Edwards

Well, I have only been doing this for more than thirty-five years, so being humbled by Mother Nature is nothing new. I still take it personal.

The much anticipated and predicted winter storm for the weekend fizzled, at least for a large part of central Minnesota. Plenty of fresh snow cover blanketed the ground in far north central Minnesota.

Snowfall observations gathered by the Duluth NWS Office

The surface system that is important for low level lift to induce snowflakes with warm air advection tracked through northern Missouri, while the upper level dynamics that work to enchance snow growth traveled through Minnesota, slightly out of sync with the surface system. There was never really orgnanized, steady moderate snowfall over much of the state Saturday afternoon and evening.

Give me credit for getting the cold temperatures correct this morning. International Falls recorded a low of 31 below zero which was only 3 degrees shy of the record 34 below set in 2005.

CE
naturesmessenger.com

Solar minimum

Posted at 4:40 PM on January 5, 2009 by Paul Huttner (8 Comments)

NASA SOHO image shows a blank sun without sunspots, an indication of "solar minimum."

It's a quiet sun these days.

We are between sunspot cycles as we begin 2009. And we hit what most sun wathcers regard as "solar minimum" in 2008. In fact 2008 was the least active sunspot year since 1913!

Astronomers watch an 11 year sunspot cycle that has been very regular since the 1700's. The last peak was in 2001 when there were 150-175 sunspots observed on the sun. 2008 was closer to 6, with a "blank sun" 266 days last year!

The current lull between solar cycle 23 and 24 seems alarming, but experts point out that the low sunspot numbers and duration are very normal between solar cycles. The next cycle is forecast to peak in about 2012. Astronomers are watching for an increase in sunspots in 2009 as we begin the new cycle.

Solar activity does have an impact on our weather and climate. Current thinking from climate experts like Dr. Kerry Emanuel from MIT is that while solar variability does have an impact on the earth's global temperature; human induced greenhouse gasses exert about 5 times the climate forcing effect when compared with solar variability.

That might explain why 2008, the least active sunspot year in the past 95 years, was still the 10th warmest year globally even though it was slightly cooler than the past decade. It will be interesting to see what happens to our global temperatures in the next 5 years as the new solar cycle kicks into thigh gear.

PH

Comment on this post