Green Baron

Could this be merged with your other Yellowstone thread ? No. Well, for NASA, but they seem to need arguments for they existence, they show some wild guessing every now and then :-/ That's what a "plan" shared with the media instead of putting it to discussion in the scientific community looks like. Like a colony on Mars, one can dream a lot, but not realise it ;-) That Wilcox guy is a robot engineer, maybe they cut his funds ? I am nasty ... :-) Let me give you a research task: you live in the area, that you mentioned in the other thread. Got to the visitor center and browse the literature, try to find out from the sciency looking publications what the scenarios are. Maybe you can even speak with the guys there. We'll then compare them to known historic or prehistoric events. The main mass extinction tkes place right now is the one we produce ourselves. In is no threat to humanity yet. I read there is an extensive investigation going on by the USGS (your countries geological survey, that's where the specialists for the subject sit) of getting a picture of the hydrology in and around the caldera. That'll go one for several years, maybe even decades and will produce a stack of master and phd thesis' about things few can imagine, like how fluids change rocks (Alteration) in different pressure, temperature and chemical composition regimes and so on and so on. Relax, everything will be fine (famous last words) :-) Edit: https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/yellowstone/hazard_summary.html

And launch next try might be end of September.

A shadow can destabilize as well. Classic example: if the sun has shone e.g. on a cornfield for several hours then there is a lot of warm air between the blades (not sure if they are called so, the stems of grass ?). You surely know the effect from a summer afternoon when hiking through the fields, before they are mowed. A shadow (like from a cloud or the said eclipse) passing over it cools the overlying air and so immediately opens the way for the hot ground air to rise, a gust goes over the field, sometimes strong enough to form a little dust devil. If the rising package of air reaches a height where it condensates it can build these towers. On a hot dry afternoon these thermal clouds sometimes start to rain, one can see the veil but the rain doesn't reach the ground. A shower/thunderstorm passing over land partly feeds itself by ingesting warm ground air in front of it, air that it has itself labilised, thus lasting long through the night even when the sun has long gone. Generally spoken, of course :-)

Thunderstorms, if they form because of insolation (isolated ones usually do, in contrast to cold fronts where cold air destabilises the troposphere in a line) can fall apart when they form too early in the day. The morning sun destabilises by heating the ground layer, the ground layer shoots up, clouds form, maybe a shower or even thundershower but then the shadow blocks the sun from further heating the ground. If no other means of labilisation exist (cold air at altitude, warm/moist at lower levels) then the shower dissipates. In the afternoon or evening, when the sun is low, it can shine under cloud, keeping the fire going, thus feeding longer lasting thunderstorms that drift with the overall wind and can keep going until the early morning. This is, of course, a generalisation ....

Gravity is one of the four fundamental forces in physics. It exists. Fullstop. You can ask "why is the sky blue", that is deducible, the fundamental forces aren't. A yet-to-be-found theory of everything might one day be able to tell us more. Edit: you might want to dive into General Relativity as a means to describe the effect of Gravity but that wasn't quite the question ...

Errr, i am confused. Why is the tube that long ? The focuser sits quite low ... isn't it a newton or do you consider the part above the focuser a rigid dew shield ? Or just for historic reasons, focal length planned to be longer ?

Outch ...

Morning (well, already after lunch here) :-) How are things on the Windwards Leeward Islands of course tststs ?

Ventusky & co are just websites that use data from the national weather services and present them in a more or less convenient way mixed with ads and tracking software, or, to put it more courteous, they focus on "data visualisation". There is nothing special about it, they don't run supercomputers and don't do own research. They may be "right" today and "wrong" tomorrow. I've seen that several times over the past 15 years. The by far best sources are indeed the weather offices, and in front (probably together with others, idk) the American NOAA and German DWD because the can afford the biggest computers and have the best educated (and paid) folks and their own developed global, regional and local weather models. They are regularly involved in publications and research. The officials hold themselves back as to any words that exceed the model's forecast range (usually less than 8 days, but depends on synopsis as well as local or regional things, the subject or statistical confidence). That's why you'll never hear something like "in 10 days people will drown on the Bahamas" because they know by experience that this may be or may not be. The "data presentation" sites are less contained, they predict happy over the model's limits and sometimes it happens to fit right in, sometimes not. They have no reputation to loose, shut down and open anew the other day under a different name. Just sayin', to sharpen the senses :-)

I'll have the ... no, not now ... later :-) Every drink has its time :-)

No, and i didn't state that, but 12bft is. Do you want to fight with me ? Nonsense, it is not a guess but a rational assessment of the situation. Sure they had their methods and probably a higher knowledge than today's sailors. The wind (still today) is well judged by the sea (definition of the beaufort scale based on the image of the sea). And the sail configuration of a tall ship corresponds to the wind, wind strength is even named by sail configuration. I am a hobby sailor and i tell you i can, single handed with a 13m sloop, easily navigate in 9bft that often blow here around the capes. Of course the sea is much calmer since the windfields are small. Those who say that is not possible simply don't know how to or how to handle their boat ! Records starting at mid 19th century are good enough for the weather services, so let's not make a question of belief out of it ;-)

Yes, we can (see below). Here's the link i forgot, in general data is better than you think. What i know is that an 18th century clipper still sails in 11 beaufort with small for and aft triangular sails. It takes down sails and runs under bare poles in hurricane conditions. There was a lot of traffic on the oceans and terrestrial observations can be combined with ships logs (as is the case today, the fancy satellites are just an add-on). Saying that low cat hurricanes where mortally dangerous is to generalized, though it was surely stressier than today for men and material. Edit: for those who question themselves: a bigger problem than the mere wind is a dynamic sea, especially from the side. But that leads too far here ... Here's modern data: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170124111330.htm ;-)

The discussion is about weather, or not ? Hurricanes will be forgotten in November ... ;-) Climate models actually predict(ed) more and intenser hurricanes on the Atlantic and have apparently failed for the public until now, but a few cat 1 and even 2 this year have already formed on the Atlantic but dissipated when turning north, so there where hurricanes but unnoticed by the public. And category 5 ones are a newer invention. I think we had already more this century until today than the whole 20th and half of the 18th century. I am talking of Atlantic hurricanes only. Can't remember where i read that ... The problem is, weather doesn't stick to a tact or frequency. Imagine a state machine that has several switches that, when the trigger is pressed, release at lot of energy at once. Whether climate (not weather, your linked text deals with a global model) can be seen as a heat engine is highly debated. Even if global warming leadsto less or more temperature differences in the lower or upper atmosphere is not quite clear, you can find models for both assumptions. Tendency lately goes towards higher differences in the atmosphere between latitudes which would weaken the heat engine position a little. Atmosphere as a heat engine: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/climate-change-altering-global-heat-engine-180954079/

And severe weather is more than hurricanes ;-) Draughts, monsoons, flooding, and their impact have increased and are increasing. https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/climate-information/climate-change-and-variability (i just saw it's from 2014, things have further changed since then) I linked to your countries weather service because it is clearly not exaggerating anything. Other countries services are by far less contained in their publications. Edit: i am only echoing common knowledge here, dear mods :-) Let's hope the Caribbean isn't hit too hard ... i see a new depression is forming in the central Atlantic ...

The world is bigger than the US, dear colleague :-) And overall the intensities and frequencies have grown. As to what hits or not: let's hope for the best ! Edit: just search this years monsoon and it's number of deaths, damage and its effect on water, agriculture and infrastructure.

Certainly not. But we have to get used to more full blown weather events in the future. Right now there is no other hurricane in the Atlantic, but this year's season is about to shake the legs. "Usually" lasts until November.

"We" don't have hurricanes because the conditions for forming aren't given here. Westerly winds prevail, higher temperature differences, typical cyclones pass in a row that stick to the standard and sometimes the northern Atlantic high stretches out to the western fringes. Our weather is mostly defined by smaller scale occurrences and a highly subdivided landscape. Depending on where you live in Spain, you can have whole families of dustdevils, some 200m in diameter. I saw those in the area around Piedrahíta in August. Very intense thermals there, cloud base 5000m, very nice to paraglide for the experienced, frozen fingers included (in August) ;-) Heavy rain events in winter on the southern coast, when the Mediterranean is still warm, can still cause considerable damage. We rarely have tornados in Europe because the polar front and subtropic air rarely mix together. But as overall energy and moisture in the atmosphere rises due to warming and more and more of the landmass becomes inhabited we observe ever more of these things because we tend to only observe things that concern our little selves or property (As we have seen above threats to the lives of others are sometimes ignored.). European tornados usually don't have the strength of the big funnels we know of the American chaser videos and overall houses in Europe are rather built of stone than wood, so they are damaged but usually not that easily levelled. And you were right, even without swearing but statistics of the weather services these events are becoming much more frequent. One can sail in quiet conditions of the coast of Almería in 25°C and have a view of the snow-covered peaks of the "Snowy Mountains" ...

I am actually putting my hope in later this year. Yes, i have an account on astrobin (Green_Baron) but haven't posted anything yet. My tries on Andromeda galaxy and Orion nebula aren't really that sophisticated yet :-)

I would if i could, believe me ! I mounted everything several times in the past weeks. But either clouds came in, there was too much dust, gusty winds rattled the setup (like >50km/h) or a windshear mixed up the air. Right now it is too dusty, i can hardly see the mountain top 3-4km away. Tomorrow they say 20-30 knots in free air, which could mean hefty gusts again here on the leeside. Last time (thursday) it looked like a clear sky i had an fwhm of 3.5 at best. That isn't really a good database for sharp photos, or is it ? I do admire your work and that you've mastered the hubble palette and narrowband and all ! So, if you decide you don't want to post here any more i'll be sure to visit your astrobin pages. I am also astonished about the outcome, given you live in a brightly lit metropolitan area. It just seems that you are the crack here right now we can only "like" it, until we have caught up to discuss with you :-)

Not nice .

So that's a roadrunner that until now (which is longer than many here can imagine) i only knew from comics ... *meepmeep*

Seems like the poor people on the northern Leewards, in Haiti/Dominican Republic, eventually Cuba will not get away easily. Those countries don't have the economic power to just rebuild, potable water, electricity, food is sparse. Haiti hasn't yet recovered from the last earthquake. I hope it doesn't become as bad as it seems to be developing ...

What is this about ?

Now we leave the Dinos behind *waveshand* I am clearly on the side of those who call us a subspecies of Homo sapiens. I also see Neandertals as a subspecies, ergo Homo sapiens neandertalensis. This is debated, sometimes with arguments like "it must (not) be so it shall (not) be" but anyway they interbred and we all have a part of the Neandertal genome in us, and there is much more evidence than that, even skeletons that can be interpreted as having features of both subspecies (Lagar Velho 1).