Changes Coming!

2009 is right around the corner. Hard to believe isn't it? It is this time of year that we spend our time doing two things: our multi-hazard educational tours, and working on the chase vehicles so they are ready to go when the new year arrives. You'll have to keep an eye on the website as two new vehicles are being added to the Chasing4Life fleet! What are they? Who's driving them? We're not telling you yet, but we WILL tell you that there are no NEW driver's on the team and we have NOT removed a truck from the roster...

Stay tuned.

Dodge City

Dodge City was a blast and we wished we could have stayed longer. The folks at both Comanche and Soule Intermediate Centers really made our day enjoyable! Its been a while since Dorothy was surrounded by over 300 kids at one time!

New Tour Leg

Hello again, everyone! Bloggin has been a little sparse lately as we have been getting ready for the new tour leg, and we are now on the road again! This tour will include dates in Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois and Las Vegas! While Brennan and I are heading east, Ben's heading west. The team will be back on November 23 for a one week break and then we're off again, so we'll be updating you from the road.

If you would like to see where we are at, check out the calendar on the website, and if you are trying to grab a date, you had better catch us now at tour@chasing4life.org because we now have dates scheduled as far in advance as June, 2011!

We're in Dodge City, Kansas right now enjoying MUCH warmer weather than we've experienced in Nebraska lately, but we'll be in Chicago soon...brrr!

We'll keep you updated as best we can. Keep checking back!

Anne Pressly 1982-2008

Little Rock anchorwoman Anne Pressly, who was found viciously beaten in her home, has passed away due to her injuries. Our thoughts and prayers are with the entire KATV crew and staff as well as with Anne’s friends and families as they cope with this horrible loss.

We'll be okay

In an effort to educate you in all things weather, here is a temperature indication chart we have devised...

60 above zero: Floridians turn on the heat. Nebraskans start planting.

50 above zero: Californians shiver uncontrollably. People are sunbathing in Scottsbluff.

40 above zero: Most imported cars won’t start. Nebraska motorcyclists are on a Poker Run to Ainsworth.

32 above zero: Distilled water freezes. The water in the Platte gets thicker.

20 above zero: People in New Mexico don long johns, parkas and wool hats & mittens. Nebraskans throw on a flannel shirt.

15 above zero: New York landlords finally turn on the heat. People in Nebraska have one last outdoor Husker-themed BBQ before it gets cold.

Zero: People in Miami all die. Nebraskans start to close the windows.

10 below zero: Californians fly away to Mexico. Nebraskans start to dig out the cool insulated Pioneer Seeds jacket they won last year in the Husker Harvest Days drawing.

25 below zero: Hollywood disintegrates. Girl Scouts in Nebraska are now selling cookies door to door in North Platte.

40 below zero: Washington, D.C. finally runs out of hot air. People in Scottsbluff let their dogs sleep indoors.

100 below zero: Santa Claus abandons the North Pole. Nebraskans get upset because the Pick-up won’t start.

460 below zero: ALL atomic motion stops (absolute zero on the Kelvin scale). People in Nebraska can be heard to say, “Cold ’nuff for ya?”

500 below zero: Hell freezes over. Nebraska public schools open 2 hours late.

COOL STUFF

Well, I have not blogged for a few days, but due to the lack of emails lately compared to what I usually get, I am assuming everyone has been busy watching the political and economic fronts and so the blog was not getting much attention. We have some cool things happening, literally and figuratively, so its time to update you all again.

It is the season for hay rack rides and pumpkins, the time of year when you are supposed to rake your leaves and let the little ones play in the pile (by the way, do NOT burn your leaves while the kids are still in them!). Unfortunately, any dream you might have had about a romantic walk in the park or playing with the kids in the leaves is about to be blown to smithereens!

We have a really strong low pressure system that is organizing with an eye on Nebraska for the middle of the week, and if you have not heard, this system is not only going to bring the chilly rain we are experiencing today, but is about to bring 40 to 50 MPH winds and the chance of 4 to 6 (or 8?) inches of snow!

Now, we are Nebraskans, so snow is not all that frightening, but we have games to bring the kids to, students that are new to the driving scene, and of course, many of us have not even winterized our cars. Folks, take a few moments and get ready for this. Leave earlier, check tire pressure, and get some warm clothes and a blanket and get them in the trunk of the jalopy BEFORE you wish you had. This is severe winter weather, even though its early, and now is not the time to procrastinate.

We’re going to see high winds following the drop in temps from the 50’s we have now to the lower 40’s, and the nights will be COLD.

This storm system is expected to organize late in the day today, and by Wednesday we’ll start to see that snow right through much of Thursday. Traveling will be difficult with the high winds (gusts to 50 MPH), so watch yourself in those high profile vehicles.

Now, since we are talking about “cool” weather, here’s another cool thing:

In about two weeks we will be releasing a new website. The Chasing4Life fan Club website is about finished, and if you would like to be one of the first to be in the guestbook, email me at info@chasing4life.org and we’ll give you the “hidden link” so you can get a sneak peak.

The new website is being managed by an old friend and fan and hosts a calendar, contest information, a Chasing4Life store, photo gallery and more! Plans are to release the new video about Chasing4Life’s founder entitled “How I Got Here” on the fan club website!

The fan club has been created because so many of you have asked for one and requested special events just for fans, so the site will keep you updated about fan events, special opportunities, releases and trips! We’ll have contests, like the old “Chase the Chaser” contest we had a few years ago, and we’ll be adding more and more merchandise to the Chasing4Life Fan Club Store every month.

So let’s review. Cool weather and cool new site. Be prepared for both.

California Heat and Nebraska Cold

Wildfires continued to burn through Southern California today after burning up nearly 27,000 acres statewide, claiming two lives and forcing thousands of people to flee their homes.

The worst of the three major blazes is a heavy brush fire speeding along the steep, dry terrain at Browns Canyon, about 30 miles northwest of Los Angeles. The Sesnon fire, which started Monday, nearly doubled overnight to 10,000 acres, forcing the evacuations of more than 2,000 homes.

Firefighters seem to be gaining on the second San Fernando Valley area fire. The Marek fire in Little Tujunga and Kagal canyons was 70 percent contained after charring nearly 5,000 acres and 44 buildings and driving 1,800 people from their homes.

Along with heat and low humidity, the sporadic Santa Ana winds -- blowing for the first time this fall -- have fueled the fires, gusting at times up to 60 mph. The winds let up a little today, but we expect that the winds will pick up again and tomorrow will be another rough day.

In other news…Omar is strengthening and pounding Columbia, Northern Venezuela, Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao. Omar is beginning to form an eyewall, and could be a hurricane by morning. The storm is expected to turn northeastward tonight as an upper-level trough of low pressure digs far enough south to pull the storm towards the Virgin Islands and northern Lesser Antilles Islands.

Conditions are favorable for TD 16 to intensify into a tropical storm. The system is expected to track very coast to the coast of Honduras, and this proximity to land should limit intensification potential. A west-southwesterly motion into the northern coast of Honduras is not expected, since the latest set of model runs keeps TD 16 just offshore. However, it would not take much of a deviation in track for TD 16 to make landfall in northern Honduras.

Tropical Depression Nana has been torn apart by wind shear of 30-40 knots. Regeneration is unlikely due to the continued high wind shear expected along its path. The small area of disturbed weather south-southeast of Nana has also been disrupted by high wind shear, although latest satellite loops show a small amount of heavy thunderstorm activity still clinging to the east side. The shear should prevent either system from redeveloping.

As for here at home in KHAS Land, tonight is rain again, mostly central and east while clear in the west with lows in the 40’s to the east, possibly 35 degrees overnight in central Nebraska.

Brrrr!

Wednesday I am going to call for a partly cloudy and not too cheerful morning, but I expect the sun will come out in the afternoon with highs in the mid-50’s. We’ll see temps back down in the 30’s overnight again with some chance of rain on Thursday to the north and east, but Friday may be a good sunny day to mow that lawn one last time with highs in the 60’s.

*COUGH* *GASP* FLU?

Well, it seems that that wonderful time of the year has arrived when we need to talk about the flu. Despite the fact that it is a common, annual ordeal here in America, few people are reall aware of what the flu is. The flu is a contagious respiratory illness caused by influenza viruses and can cause mild to severe illness, and at times can lead to death. The best way to prevent the flu is by getting a flu vaccination each year.

Each year in the United States 5% to 20% of the population actually get the flu! That’s a lot of people! More than 200,000 people are hospitalized because of flu complications, and about 36,000 people die from the flu each and every year!

Older people, younger childen and people with certain health conditions such as asthma, diabetes and heart disease are at a high risk for flu complications. According to my own research, storm chasers are also highly susceptible since I seem to get it EVERY YEAR!

Wonder if you have the flu? The flu is generally accompanied by fever, headache, extreme tiredness, dry cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose and muscle aches. When you have the flu you can also experience nausea, vomiting and diarrhea which is more common in adults.
Complications of flu can include bacterial pneumonia, ear infections, sinus infections, dehydration, and worsening of chronic medical conditions, such as congestive heart failure, asthma, or diabetes.

Flu viruses spread mainly from person to person through coughing or sneezing of people with influenza. Sometimes people may become infected by touching something with flu viruses on it and then touching their mouth or nose. Most healthy adults may be able to infect others beginning 1 day before symptoms develop and up to 5 days after becoming sick.

As the snow starts to fly in the western states this weekend and the kids are running around with the sniffles, make sure you increase your handwashing, look into the flu shot this year, and if you think that you have the flu, consult your physician and don’t head into the office or send your sick kid to school.While you are enjoying your weekend, we’ll be here as always, watching the weather, and maybe we’ll have a tropical update for you by Monday as the Atlantic is starting to percolate again. If nothing else, we’ll discuss the snow forecast…

Same Old Same Old

John woke up early this morning. It was cold, the temp was barely 40 degrees, but there was work that had to be done; after all, nobody was going to fix that combine for him. A phone call at 6:00 a.m. to his wife and a quick cup of hot chocolate was the only interruption so far today.

The welding done, John needs to fill the fuel tank on the utility truck and then go move that last pivot so he can start to winterize it.

He’s got a list nobody can see- it’s in his head, the same place the daily “to do” list is always kept, and he’ll work until long after sunset tonight to get it all done. Since yesterday was no different, I doubt tomorrow will be either.

He won’t visit with anyone today and won’t make it up to the café for lunch either. He’ll pass his brothers on a gravel road once or twice as they have fields ready as well, but there’s no time for talking…there’s work to be done.

We talk about disaster resilience a lot in this blog, and perhaps this is one of the best examples of “resilient”. While Wall Street and Washington both seem shocked after the results (or lack of results) from the bail-out bill, it is not really effecting John, nor is it effecting his banker- a long time friend and farmer himself.

Why is it that the effect is not felt here on John’s farm or at his bank? Because of conservatism. John has invested in his life, in the work of his hands and in family. The local bank has invested in folks like John.

It’s what makes Nebraska great.

In a KHAS interview yesterday with Five Points Bank President Terry Anstine, Anstine said: "Nebraska is a little bit boring. We missed out maybe on the boom, but we can smile that we are not missing out on the bust.”

Sometimes boring is good.

I was confused...

For those of you following the election, you might find some humor in how confusing it all has become over the last several days. You might have read the story of how Vice-Presidential hopeful Sarah Palin accused Barak Obama as being friendly with terrorists.

Imagine my shock when I found out that she was referring to Obama’s connection to Weather Underground!

It took a minute or two of reading the whole story before I was laughing.

Where did all this come from? That is where I find the humor…

In 1969, a small group of college student left radicals announced their intentions to overthrow the U.S. government in opposition to the Vietnam War. Mr Obama once served on a charity board with an ex-member of this US-based militant group called Weather Underground, Bill Ayers, now a University of Illinois professor.

The group was intitially known as “The Weathermen” and later the “Weather Underground Organization”. The group was an American radical left organization founded in 1969 by leaders and members who split from the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). The group organized a riot in Chicago in 1969 and bombed buildings in the 1970s.

They took their name from the lyric "You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows," from the Bob Dylan song "Subterranean Homesick Blues". They also used this lyric as the title of a position paper they distributed at an SDS convention in Chicago on June 18, 1969, as part of a special edition of New Left Notes.

The Weathermen were initially part of the Revolutionary Youth Movement (RYM) within the SDS, splitting from the RYM's Maoists by claiming there was no time to build a vanguard party and that revolutionary war against the United States government and the capitalist system should begin immediately. Their founding document called for the establishment of a "white fighting force" to be allied with the "Black Liberation Movement" and other "anti-colonial" movements to achieve "the destruction of US imperialism and achieve a classless world: world communism."

Now, I am not political, but could not resist posting a blog about this and making sure that we had our facts straight…

Since 1995, “Weather Underground” has meant a completely different thing. Weather Underground is a commercial weather service that provides real-time weather information via the Internet. Weather Underground provides weather reports for most major cities across the world on its Web site, as well as local weather reports for newspapers and Web sites. Most of its United States information comes from the National Weather Service (NWS), as information from that agency is within the public domain by federal law. The Web site is available in many languages, and an ad-free version of the site with additional features is available for an annual fee.

Here’s some more of the humor… Weather Underground is based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and was founded in 1995 as an offshoot of the University of Michigan's Internet weather database.

The name is indeed a tongue-in-cheek reference to the 1960s militant radical leftist student group the Weather Underground, which also originated at the same university.

Jeff Masters, a PhD candidate in meteorology at the University of Michigan, working under the direction of Professor Perry Samson, wrote a menu-based telnet interface in 1991 that displayed real-time weather information around the world. By 1992, the two servers they used were the most popular service on the Internet. In 1993 they initiated a project to bring Internet weather into K-12 classrooms around the country.

In 1995 the Weather Underground, Inc. evolved as a commercial entity separate from the university. It has grown to provide weather for print sources, in addition to its online presence.

Today, the KHAS Chasing4Life Chase Team still recommends Weather Underground to attendees at events as the very best source for weather and utilizes the service as a part of our tracking center, educational events and in monitoring weather on a daily basis.

Around our Tracking Center, the name Jeff Masters is spoken almost everyday, considered by our team to be one of the most accurate sources for weather forecasts.

Well, all that to say... I am very relieved to find out that one of our favorite weather monitoring sources has not been compromised by terrorists...for a minute there, I was worried...

Recuperating and Preparing

It has been an interesting week. Recuperating from a serious surgery gave me a lot of time to think; translation: I WAS SO BORED.

On top of being only able to sit around, the weather offered nothing to get excited about.

My boredom was eliminated Wednesday as the team ventured out with their recuperating (and crabby) leader and headed out to Cozad, Nebraska where we hooked up with sister station KNOP before presenting on stormchasing and home disaster kits to the folks of Cozad at an awesome event hosted by the Cozad Church of Christ. The church has chosen to host a series of disaster resilience training events and workshops throughout 2009, and we are looking forward to working with these folks who have great vision and energy.

Thursday morning brought the team to Ravenna where we presented to the folks at the Ravenna Senior Citizen’s Center. While the presentation went well, we had more fun discussing old weather history from the area with the folks at the center and discussing the possibilities the winter holds for us all.

Next Thursday we will be back at the center to show our new Chasing4Life documentary film “The Oconto Project”, the first public showing of the documentary since its creation earlier this summer.

At both events we talked to great lengths about the trends of this year’s severe weather and the consensus was that we are going to watch the month of October closely. Most people still relate tornado season with the spring, yet historically, October has almost always proven to be an active month for severe weather, and we have 4 weeks ahead of changing weather.

Now, onto hurricanes…

Usually October is also the peak of hurricane season, the busiest being the season we would like to forget: 2005 when we had 7 named storms, three hurricanes and one large hurricane…WILMA the strongest hurricane on record.

A lot of folks see the plummeting temps here as a reason for less severe weather, but actually, the drastic changes in temps are what can encourage such weather, and the hurricanes in October could be no different with water temps declining a little, but warm waters still prevalent enough, especially throughout the Caribbean to sustain or grow a major hurricane or two before we enter November.

Here’s today’s weather tidbit:

There is an oscillation in the atmosphere called the Madden-Julian Oscillation, or MJO. The MJO is a pattern of enhanced rainfall that travels along the equator and can boost hurricane activity when it heads into the Atlantic. The MJO has a period of about 30 to 60 days and is currently in its active phase over the Atlantic. According to the latest models, the MJO should stay active at least through the middle of the month.

What does this mean?

Well, with a month of activity in the gulf region, a lot could change for us here as well…with the team heading to Iowa and Dodge City, Kansas next, a few hurricanes and a few tornadoes? It could be a fun month.