Spaghetti plots – Page 9

Nice day, OK clouds

Here they are, left column:

SONY DSC — 7:09 AM. Altocumulus, trending toward perlucidus. Height? Aout 13,000 feet above the ground, from reading the TUS sounding. Temperature? -10 C (14 F). No ice trails visible.

The weather ahead

A huge buckle in the jet stream is forecast to form right off the West Coast in about a week, and its a pretty spectacular interruption in the pattern of a jet stream whizzing by far to the north of us that we have had now for sometime. Below is an example of ‘now” in the jet stream winds, and below that, a forecast panel (from IPS Meteostar) showing this striking change a week from now. There’s a big (“high amplitude”) trough in the eastern Pacific, a high amplitude ridge (hump in the jet stream toward the Pole) in the West and another big trough in the East.

Patterns like this are usually associated with extremes in temperatures; warmth in the West; cold in the East. It is certain when this pattern materializes in about a week, some high temperature records will fall somewhere in the West and some low temperature records will fall in the East. In the West, warm air is drawn far northward, aided by low pressure centers spinning around in the eastern Pacific, while in the East, cold air zooms down with high pressure centers from northern Canada.

Why bother talking about a forecast a week in advance?

Because it has a lot of “credibility” in our ensemble (spaghetti) plots. Here is last night’s “ensembles of spaghetti” plot produced by NOAA for one week in advance. Look below at these “ensemble members” the different blue lines, ones that are loaded with slight errors at the beginning of the model run, to see how strong the forecast a week ahead is.

Those bunched blue lines in the eastern Pacific (see arrow) inspired this whole spiel about the coming change because its a nice example of when the plots show something reliable in the way of a longer term forecast, and in this case, a forecast that also shows a big change in the weather patterns over thousands and thousands of miles, from eastern Pacific to the western Atlantic.

If you’re looking around this whole plot, you’ll see the lines are also very bunched in the extreme western Pacific and westward across Asia. Those blue lines are always bunched over there because there is little variance in the flow in that region; its locked into a pattern by the geography, unlike in the central and eastern Pacific and into the US where the jet stream is MUCH more variable. A simile: imagine a fire hose turned on at the hydrant, the part of the hose at the hydrant stays in place while the end of the hose flops wildly around. Its something like that; western Pacific to eastern Pacific.

Our weather?

Well, after all that gibberish, not much change will occur here; its everywhere but here! Seems we’re doomed to another dry seven to 10 days ahead with occasional periods of high clouds and great sunsets as weak disturbances from the sub-tropics pass by, ones that can only produce Cirrus clouds.

Some clouds; excessive excitement over model flip flops (web crawlers: not about shoes or girls wearing them) for late November

Here they are:

Today? More pretty clouds.

The weather way ahead, like on November 29th

Just after I was asserting from this typewriter that the big storm, the Great Wet Hope in late November, was surely bogus, out popped another wet forecast for AZ n the model run crunching global data from 11 AM AST yesterday. Here it is below, first panel. You MAY remember that the nice early rains that we had in November last year were associated with a similar pattern of an upper low center near San Diego.

What to think of this “outlier” forecast, one NOT supported in the ensemble of spaghetti plots (model runs where small errors are deliberately input to see how those runs change from the ones based on the actual data). There very little support for panel 1 in those “perturbed” runs, but there it was again, a big AZ rain!

Well, its still unlikely, but the chance of it actually happening are now much improved. Something out there is causing the model to come up with a good rain in AZ at the end of the month. I did not think I would see any rain again in AZ in any more model runs.

And, sure enough, the model run based on data just 6 h later than the one shown in the first panel, took it away again! See the second map below and look at the astonishing differences over Arizona and the Southwest overall!

I won’t show it, but the “perturbed with errors” model runs that we look for to discern credibility in the longer term forecasts like these, STILL does not support much of a chance for a rain to be realized on the 29th.

But, that second appearance of an “outlier” in another model run….hmmmmmmm. Will be watching for a return; you start to get a feeling that it might well be seen again.

As I finish this blog blurb, the 11 PM global data should have been crunched by now, and will look to see if there is yet another huge change (well, there are always large changes, but here, I’m talkin’ for us!) Will let you know in about 2 minutes…. Stand by, generating new web window now…..

Oh, my gosh! Its changed again (3rd panel) to a huge West Coast troughy situation, completely different than the run at 5 PM AST last evening with the big ridge over us (bulge to the north). I have to post this latest map, again for late on November 29th. The situation you see in the third panel leads to another big rain forecast in AZ, though a couple of days later, early December! This is so great! Compare the second and third maps.

Now, you can really start to put some credibility in the supposed “outlier” forecast and, as a discerning meteorologist, say to the spaghetti plots with their little deliberate errors, “Go to HELL! You’re missing something big out there with those puny errors you start with.”

Calming down now, well, you can’t cast the thought of warm dry weather (seond panel) for late November out yet, but something IS being missed out there, which makes this an exciting period–just to see what happens. Though an admitted precipofile, at least here in AZ, not so much in SEA, I am putting my mental marbles on the trough in the West depictions now. Just a hunch.

The End.

Another big Cirrus streamer from the Equator heading our way!

Well, when there’s no rain in the model predictions for 15 days, you have to get excited about something….

Like a solar flare, there has been another massive ejection of high clouds from the equatorial region and its heading toward Catalina, AZ. Here, from the Washington Huskies Weather Department¹, is a 24 h loop of the event. Hope our cell phones still work. Here’s the latest still image:

annotated 201211141030 — Satellite image for 3:30 AM AST supplemented with various interesting annotations, some of which are correct.

What are the ramifications of ejected Cirrus coming all the way from the Equator to Catalina? Pretty skies, sunsets and sunrises, which is quite important to us humans. Also, when it starts arriving today, we’ll have milder nighttime temperatures. Yes, even Cirrus clouds cut down the outgoing longwave radiation leaving the earth’s surface at night, and of course, moderates the incoming visible (shortwave) radiation (sometimes called “sunlight”). We don’t want to dumb this down too much.

After 9-11, when all the aircraft stopped flying for a week some guys at a small university, one so small I don’t think it even had a football team, found that the daytime and nightime temperatures were affected by the lack of contrails. Daytime temperatures were a spec higher and nighttime temperatures a tiny bit lower, suggesting that even CONTRAILS have an effect on the weather and climate. It was an important finding. Of course, without a football team I am clueless, as are you are, concerning what university those findings came from.

You know what gets a lot of us scientists about that contrail study after 9-11, is that something simple and important was done that I (we) could have done had only we thought of it. We’re kind of bitter about it. Might have got a raise, too, got the name out there. Citation index fluffed up some. We’re dealing with a lot of loss here. Heck, you probably could have done this, too, it was that easy.

The study of contrails is a pretty big topic these days, though the effects are deemed small for the present. Here’s a short article for you. Here’s an unrelated one, one about smog’s effects on clouds, but one you should read, anyway. Might be true. Reading the second one is like doing an extra pushup. Its good for you. And me since one of the authors of the second article (Danny Rosenfeld) criticized me (and Pete Hobbs) royally in print in the late 90s only because we said his work was invalid. Show’s I’m magnanimous, following the ideals of science meaning that as scientists we have no personal feelings about our detractors.

Yeah right. Check the climate blogs and those ones who refuse to allow other scientists to even comment on their work! Its a hideous situation out there now, far from the ideals of science where one WELCOMES criticism. But, I diverge….getting worked up when I should be concentrating on clouds.

BTW, that little blob of clouds north of the ice cloud mass coming at us, is due to a little disturbance that will hit the coast of Cal in a few days. With it, the clouds here will get pretty thick, probably as will happen later today or tomorrow with the ice clouds, causing the optical depth to exceed 4.00000000000 (4).

What does an optical depth of four mean?

That means that the sun’s position is not discernable. (Also, can’t be a Cirrus cloud, BTW, but rather Altostratus if its an all ice cloud). Optical depth is usually something used by the smog folks. A really clean sky has an optical depth of 0.05 or even less. Smog laden skies, such is the coastal areas of southern California, or back East on humid days in the summer, have optical depths of 0.2-0.5 at times, horizontal visibility might only be a mile or three; the leaves are gray and the sky is brown, as the song says. Aren’t we happy we don’t have that kind of smog?

Looking way out, just now, I saw this in the ensemble of spaghetti, thought you should see it, too.

While no weather beyond warm breezes and high clouds is portended here, where would you really like to be in the West in two weeks or so for some really heavy rains? Can you tell? What’s a place I mention too many times when comes to Cal rains? Yes, the King Range around Shelter Cove, between Frisco and Eureka. This plot gives high confidence to major flooding in northern California in the 10-15 day window. Why? Because so many of the blue lines (564 dm height contours) dip down toward the tropics in the eastern Pacific in support of the actual forecast from last night (represented by the yellow lines). Remember that the blue lines result from small errors put into the model runs at the beginning to see how robust a forecast is. The wilder the spread of the lines, the less reliable a forecast is. The more they group together, the more robust, more reliable a forecast is. They look fairly bunched up in the eastern Pacific, and this is the reason for having this plot here today. I suspect we’ll be reading about heavy rains in Cal during that 10-15 day window. It will be fun to see if we can make such a call so far in advance!

The End.

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1Nobody knows your university by its scientific accomplishments, but only by its athletic accomplishments. Its been written up. I certainly wouldn’t. If online universities could have football teams, it might be the end of “brick and mortar” universities.

Next rain in 9-10 days?

The NCEP model, using last evening’s global data, produced some green pixelation in Arizona (light rain areas are green in the model run output) for Monday night into Tuesday, November 19th-20th. However, look below at the NOAA ensemble of spaghetti plot for that day. I don’t see any rain here. Do you?

Cloud-maven juniors would be so scoffing at the thought of rain in Arizona in a computer prediction that is associated with a spaghetti plot like this for that same day! For confidence in rain that far ahead here in Catalinaland, we would need a plot that shows something like you see over Japan (upper left); the lines all squeezed together. But you don’t see them here, do you? They’re a mess, indicating the model is generally clueless about what will happen here in 9-10 days. So, while it could still happen, it has to be considered a very long shot.

MOnday Nov 20 spag_f216_nhbg — Forecast map for Monday, 5 PM AST.

Here’s the WRF-GFS model output, rendered by IPS Meteostar that shows rain in AZ, a model run in that had this green pixelation (areas where rain is forecast to fall in the preceding 12 h) for overnight Monday into Tuesday morning, the 19th-20th. Nice, but wrong. The entire model run, is rendered here in case you think I am lying about this.

I’ve added an arrow to help locate Arizona for you.

So, in view of the ensemble of spaghetti, can’t count on green pixelation remaining in Arizona in future model runs. Not starting out as a good day today.

Yesterday’s clouds and skies overall, how nice.

First, the “stratiform” clouds that were still “sprinkling-its not drizzle” as daybreak came. Then the blue skies dotted with Cu.

Big weather change coming about November 10th

The evidence is clear, see below:

annotated nov 10th spag_f240_nhbg — Ensemble plot produced by the National Center for Environmental Prediction based on global data taken at 5 PM AST last evening. Arizona, I think, is shown by an arrow. (Actually this was a faulty run having too many contours; still there is something for us to glean here.)

Or, maybe should it be, “clear?” Or, “Huh?”

Of course, the two people who read this blog know that I am a big fan of these spaghetti plots, as they are known by in the business, in elucidating the likelihood of coming weather events shown on the progs.

Today’s prog has a huge trough barging into the West at this time and again a couple of days later.

0001VZ — Valid Saturday morning, football day, November 10th. Produced by last evening’s global data taken at 5 PM AST.

But previously, these same models had a gigantic hot air containing ridge building over us between the 10th and 15th (see it here: 15 day forecast Nov 15)! Now that same model has a couple of big troughs coming through the West at that time. So which ouput is likely to be right?

By examining the spaghetti plot, it’s PLAIN to see that its the trough of cold air that is very likely, and NOT an upper level, desiccating ridge of hot air sitting over us on November 10th. Notice that there are a lot of lines swirling southward and then curling back to the north over the West Coast (look just to the “left” of where Arizona is). Well, take my word for it as a meteorologist. Hmmm. I guess that’s not the most reliable person you would want to take his word from when it comes to weather 10 days out…

Instead of hot air over us in two weeks, an invasion of uncomfortably cold air marked by the passage a sharp cold front is almost in the bag on the 10th-11th. There is a slight chance of rain, too. Rain, what’s that? Well, it falls from “clouds” and there should be some sun-blocking “clouds” with that cold front.

Get your sweaters ready.

Catalina dust to be vanquished today (?)

“?”? It goes with the predicting the future territory…

Raining at 4:19 AM! Pretty good sized drops! Wow. Current NWS forecast now says rain only after 11 AM so an early start is excellent.

Moisture is moving rapidly into southern Arizona. As an example, look at this uptick at Sells, AZ to the SW of us (green line in top panel).

The satellite view is also promising with a bank of Stratocumulus with buildups (castellanus-like) to the SW moving rapidly this way. Take a look at this, courtesy of the U of AZ, and if you look closely you’ll see some whiter specs appearing indication that a few of these clouds are getting colder tops compared to surrounding clouds.

Those whiter tops would be small Cumulonimbus clouds with rainshafts in that mass of clouds entering AZ. So, there’s a whole mass of those little guys scattered here and there in that mass of clouds heading for us.

Not likely to get too much rain out of them, however. The rain from the clouds over us now and immediately upwind is falling from clouds that are not connected to the ground and so the updrafts in them tend to be not so great. Higher updrafts usually means that more falls out the bottom if the tops of the clouds can reach that magical -10 C level up there where ice can begin to form.

Later in the day, as it warms up, the updrafts will be rooted at the ground and be stronger as the moisture revs up and with that, the chance of an organized line of showers moving in during the evening, one that might last an hour or two, goes up.

One caveat: The U of AZ mod from their 11 PM AST run (here) doesn’t see ANY rain in Catalina today, tonight, or tomorrow, which seems surprising (and likely bogus as estimated from this keyboard). It could be those clouds to the south, and the moisture intrusion we’re now getting were not seen in the data at the beginning of the model run. This output does, however, indicate that we are in a marginal rain producing situation. Usually this model is quite good.

annotated 24 h ending 10122012 00010M — 24 h rainfall ending 5 AM tomorrow, October 12th, a truly horrible depiction.

Don’t really know what’s wrong with the model, but it does seem like measurable rain will fall in Catalina, though its likely to be less than 0.25 inches. Will be pretty happy, since it is a marginal situation, if we get more than 0.10 inches, something to settle the dust and clean the desert vegetation up a bit. At the least, there will be some interesting clouds to look at!

A few more drops here at 5:13 AM! Excellent.

Looking way ahead, 14 days or so.

In the longer view, more rain for Arizona is seen, of course, in the 10-15 day model prognosis, possibly substantial ones. But last time this was predicted in the models, “upon further review” we saw that those rains were associated with a model run was an outlier of some kind, plain goofy, when we looked at the NOAA-NCEP ensemble-spaghetti plots, dammitall. So all that rain in AZ in THAT model run was almost certainly bogus.

But, once again the the models came up with some pretty good rains in Arizona, these rains derived from the model run using 5 PM AST global data from last evening. These rains are more “robust” in terms of confidence.

In fact, the situation we have right now, and the one predicted in 14 or so days, are rather similar in appearance in the spaghetti plots. Our current incoming upper low center was quite well predicted more than 10 days in advance when one examined the “spaghetti” plots.

How about the rain prediction below, goofy or what?

To answer that query, we’ll go to our friend, the NOAA NCEP ensemble-spaghetti plots here. We need to have a trough in upper levels, just like now, to have rain in the cool half of the year. Will there be one?

Gee, can’t do that based on last night’s data. No ensemble “bad balloon” plots done yet. Will have to wait, but the spaghetti plots from the night before last were encouraging. Will update this discussion when the new spaghetti plots are producted. So, after all this discussion, we’ve kind of ended up with nothing!

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This word just in minutes ago from NOAA-PSD where the ensemble plots are displayed. “System down for maintenance. Should be available later today.” Great. Then I can really ruminate on those spaghetti plots!

Pretty clouds out now (8:46 AM), take a look if you have a chance.

Tomorrow, we’ll talk about CLOUDS!

0001Qs — Valid for Friday mroning, 5 AM, October 26th. The green areas indicate the rainfall the model expected in the prior 12 h. As you can see there is a lot of coverage in AZ.

Map discussion

The weather ahead

Since we have no weather/clouds to blab about now, it seemed like a good idea to look ahead at our fantasy weather, produced by models, and see what they have for us. And in these future weather charts, something once again for us here in Arizona to dream about. These maps below were produced from global data taken at 5 PM AST last evening. Check these rainy maps out, high points annotated like cartoons FYI:

Annotated 216h map — Valid for Tuesday, October 9th at 5 PM AST.

Annotated 240h — Valid for Wednesday, October 10th at 5 PM AST, 24 h after the first map above. Rain intensifies in Arizona.

And what do we look at to see if this has ANY chance of verifying?

A bunch of spaghetti!

First, the upper level map at 500 millibars that goes with all the rain on that map above, that one valid for the 10th. This is to see what the upper level configuration is like that is producing this wide area of rain in the SW US.

Aha! A low center is over the interior of central California at 500 millibars, and moist air (shown in green, of course) has been drawn up into it on its eastern flank, moist air that had been over us (take my word for it). OK, this looks good.

annotated 240 500 — Valid for the afternoon of Wednesday, October 10th at 5 PM AST.

Below is one of “ensemble” plots created by putting deliberate errors in to the global data to see what happens to the predicted patterns using the real data after small errors are introduced in the initial data–very clever technique.

Will the “perturbed” maps look anything like the ones I that were produced from the real global data taken last night?

Let’s look and make some kind of interpretation that will say “yes” to rain in Arizona, beginning in 9 days (Tuesday the 9th) and continuing off and on for several days!

2012101100spag_f240_nhbg — Valid for Wednesday, October 10th at 5 PM AST

Well, since you’ve been trained in the analysis of these “spaghetti” plots, you will quickly see that it looks pretty damn promising. It is virtually GUARANTEED that an upper low center will be in the SW US, cut off from the main flow pattern which has angled northward from the Pacific into northern Canada (blue and yellow lines up there). That yellow circle over central Cal is the actual prediction, and the clustering of blue lines in that same area shows that the “errorful” predictions also see that happening. So, in that clustering of blue lines, it can be seen that our “low” in the SW is a quite reliable prediction.

Does it guarantee rain here though? Nope, just that the chances are going to be good in that October 9-12th window.

Also very, very, very, evident in this plot is that the people in the eastern third of the country are going to be very unhappy with all the cold air that they are going to experience before the middle of October. That weather is, from this plot, “in the bag.” Notice how the blue lines cluster in that area and are extruded to the south, indicating that deep cold air will be extruded from polar regions into the eastern US then. I like the word, “extruded”, BTW. Sounds great, kind of like an onomatopoeia, like “thunder.” You can feel it.

Its likely that many low temperature records will be set beginning in about a week in the Plains States and eastern US. (Remember “air” is “cold”; “temperatures” are low).

An aside: It will be interesting to see how the media handles this upcoming cold spell. It has seemed, from this keyboard, that high temperature records get more attention than low ones. We shall see.

The End.

Summer and water year rain stats

Today, something useful….

Summer 2012 rainfall, June-September: 9.04 inches, average 7.27 inches.

Water year rainfall, October 1, 2011 through September 30th, 2012: 16.00 inches, average 17.04 inches.

cropped summer 2012 rainfall — No trend in summer rainfall at Catalina evident over the past 36 years. Yay!

Cropped water year 2011-12 rainfall — While water year rainfall declined after the very wet years when Catalina records began at Our Garden, the water year rainfall has stabilized over the past 10-15 years. Yay#2.

To see surrounding values, in some cases considerably higher than Catalina’s go to the U of Arizona’s rainlog.org and in the upper right hand corner, select, “date range.” This is an enormously handy tool to compare area totals. (Some stations, however, do not have a complete record, and so some totals are ludicrously small.) Its interesting to note the isolated contributors to rainlog.org who are in British Columbia, Canada and in the Mid-west. How funny. They must really like us.

The weather ahead

The models are still indicating a cold trough and rain chances here beginning on the 9th-11th (last evening’s 11 PM AST run of the WRF-GFS model. That’s it for the next 15 days.

Here is strong evidence that we will be affected by a pretty strong lower latitude trough coming across California and combining with another one dropping down from the Pac NW, this ensemble or “spaghetti plot” from NOAA:

Notice the lack of blue contours in the northern US, AND just inside the interior of the West Coast where there are “dark spots.” Those mean that there is a pretty reliable chance of a trough in the interior of the West on the afternoon of Monday, October 8th at 5 PM AST (October 9th, 00 GMT). The absence of contours in the northern tier of the US indicates that the jet stream will be south of its usual position (suggested by the green line).

The most reliable predictions in a spaghetti plot are where the blue lines are bunched together, such as in the central and western Pacific Ocean in this output map.

All this doesn’t mean its going to rain here for sure, but there will certainly be quite a change in the temperatures here about this map time (plus or minus a day or so) and a rain threat.

The End.

While waiting for the October rains….

Not much to report really. Things aren’t going quite as I expectulated yesterday afternoon in a burst of excitement about a good rain here beginning as early as October 3rd, so maybe I won’t say anything further about that, kind of pretend like I never said anything like that. I do still think it will rain in October, however; not giving up on anything quite yet.

Next, I will distract you, get your mind off that, by showing a NOAA “ensemble” (spaghetti) plot based on last evening’s global data and let you figure it out. That should do it; this is lot better than Sudoku. This one below is valid for 5 PM AST, Friday, October 5th. You might think about what teams are very likely going to be playing in really cold air for early October based on this map, baseball or football.

Hint: where the blue lines bunch up some and extrude toward the Equator is where colder than normal air will be. The more they are bunched together, the more reliable is the forecast. Where they are scattered around, like in the SW, the more dicey the forecast.

Maybe some summer rain season stats tomorrow.

The End.

Bad things happen to good models

I got pretty worked up yesterday about the best weather maps I have ever seen for Arizona, ones produced by our best numerical forecast model, the WRF-GFS, one that had so much rain here at the end of the month, based on billions and billions of calculations. The rain in that model was due to a former hurricane (one that has not yet formed, but like me, is still merely a depressed area–in the eastern Pacific). It subsequently develops in the model into a strong tropical storm and its remains were forecast to track right into Catalina and SE Arizona and produce as much as 1.5 to 2 inches of rain in 12 h. I loved that forecast map so much! Thinking about having it framed.

And, rain in various amounts, was forecast here for a couple of model runs, not just one, before going away lately.

This is what weatherfolk deal with all the time, these model vagaries in the longer forecast range of 7-15 days. In the two maps below, one from yesterday’s blog, and the one to the right of that, the model run rain map from last night’s run for the SAME time and day, the afternoon of Friday, September 28th:

Well, that “solution” is gone now (see map at right), the one having no rain at all in AZ for the same time as the flood shown in the map at left. That remnant of a tropical storm off Baja shown on the right, just sits, spins lethargically, and dies, its moisture staying to the south of AZ now. I guess Wildcat fans will be happy that the football game on the 29th here won’t be played in the mud with some leftover rain falling.

This rain disappearance was not surprising, I guess, when “we” looked at the NOAA spaghetti plots and saw that the confidence level had to be low because of all the vagaries produced by “perturbing” the model with a little bad data at the outset of its run.

If I was a weather presenter, my 15th day would be stacked with the different forecasts produced by the model for that same day as it got closer in real time. This would be the purpose of demonstrating to my TEEVEE watchers that the forecasts for the SAME day, such as September 28th, are changing drastically: “Sunny!” “Rainy, 2 inches!” “Partly cloudy!” “Rainy, a quarter of an inch! “Sunny!” “I don’t have a clue!”–the correct answer for display.

Don’t give up all hope for rain here, though, in the coming two weeks.

First, the unpredictablility of our current situation means that the models could calculate a rainy “solution” for us at the end of the month yet. Second, another hurricane/topical storm comes marching up the coast of Baja at the end of the first week in October, heading in the direction of AZ. So, all the rain potential here in our Arizona fall is not lost yet.

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BTW, the uncertainty here was NOT the case for the weather back East in the spaghetti plots, where a cold regime has been solidly predicted there with considerable confidence in the 7-15 day range (forecast contours lines were pretty bunched up in that region AFTER the errors were introduced). Low temperature records are already falling in a few locations, and more will fall over the next two weeks.

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Clouds?

Nice pancake clouds yesterday, Stratocumulus clouds resulting from the spreading out of shallow Cumulus clouds. Here’s an example over the Cat Mountains. Tops ran about -10 C, maybe -11 C. Thought I saw a very, very fine ice veil between some clouds coming off the mountains, but, it could have been an aerosol haze. Concentrations of ice would have been VERY low, anyway, less than 1 per liter of air, in this marginal for ice-formation day.

This morning’s TUS sounding indicates a cooling at cloud top to -14 C or so. This will mean that you should see some virga around today in somewhat fatter clouds. Yay! Virga. Egad! I just looked out the window here at first light (5:50 AM), and there it is, that virga! There’ll be a real pretty sunrise as a result

The End.