Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill, CaryThe Triangle Area
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This is America! Anything that can be done/said to blame individuals other than oneself is the game plan. I'm betting there are already lawsuits filed against the news channels for not warning people enough!
We must be remembering the same storm totally differently. I clearly remember them calling for 3-5 inches around mid afternoon, then, around 5 PM then were calling for 5-7", then, around 8 PM they said it was going to be a lot worse than expected and to brace for a tremendous snowfall. Which we got. I never heard them say it would only accumulate on grassy surfaces, at least after their mid afternoon forecast.
I remember the same. I'd just arrived in NC from Florida four months earlier and was excited to finally see some snow. The excitement lasted just long enough to realize I was trapped in my own yard. And with Floyd having devastated the state just four months earlier, I was beginning to wonder if nature was trying to send me back to Florida. I made lemonade by creating a bobsled run down the hill from the house into the lower yard, which I rode using a boogie board I had no other use for this far from the ocean. Good times.
Any weather forecast, especially hurricanes, depends on computer models and simulations which tend to disagree. The forecaster has to take the data and make a prediction based on disagreeing elements.
Having written a book about weather, I find it laughable that anyone expects perfection from weather models or forecasters. The atmosphere's sheer complexity means that forecasts are by their very nature educated guesses, and even in a time where supercomputers and advanced weather satellites are integral to the process, it only takes one unforeseen element to throw everything off. A three-day forecast is today as accurate as a five-day forecast was two decades ago, but it's still not an exact science. Maybe we need to cut forecasters a little slack and just be glad that hurricanes can no longer catch us unawares, as a Cat 4 did in Galveston in 1900, killing more than six thousand people. Forecaster Isaac Cline firmly believed that the city was immune to killer storms because of the shape of the beaches and other factors, but at least he galloped up and down the beach on horseback telling people to evacuate when it became obvious he'd been wrong. Now THAT'S a blown forecast.
I don't get the compliant here at all. We heard there was a hurricane on it's way to NC even on Wednesday. So my wife and I took precautions. We were prepared and thankfully only had lost power for a couple of days. Filled up both cars with gas on Thursday, refilled our supply of batteries, got the emergency radio out of the garage, bought canned food and snacks, and verified the flashlights worked. We played board games under flashlights to pass the time. No reason at all for not being prepared.
We'll give them a pass on a few day out forecast because the atmosphere is so complex, but don't be caught doubting the 20-50 year out forecasts regarding man made global warming. Keeping all of this straight is so complex.
Last edited by ConcernedCitizenClinton; 10-13-2016 at 02:43 PM..
Reason: Typo
We'll give them a pass on a few day out forecast because the atmosphere is so complex, but don't be caught doubting the 20-50 year out forecasts regarding man made global warming. Keeping all of this straight is so complex.
It's called looking at trends over the past few years and assuming they will continue - can't quite do that forecasting weather since it's random from day to day
Maybe I'm wrong, I just expected the storm trackers to guesstimate their trends off of years of storm data in the Atlantic region. All I'm saying is that I agree that science is not exact. The hurricane predictions were off, much like the predictions forecasters predicted a decade ago regarding global warming. The best thing to do in our area for hurricane season, and the winter, is to be prepared for no power and water, regardless of forecasts.
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