(00:00:20) You're going carbon. All seven of them. That is the sound from inside the National Weather Service as recorded one evening about six weeks ago as the staff issued a tornado warning for the Twin Cities metropolitan area. Tornado had just been reported by law enforcement officials in the western suburbs. And the Weather Service staff was alerting Twin Cities area residents to take cover immediately. Good morning. This is Dan Olson reporting from the National Weather Service Office live in the Twin Cities with me as mpr's rich diekman for about the next hour and a half will be at the National Weather Service until one o'clock this afternoon. We'll be talking with meteorologist in charge John graph his assistant Ron Willis and some of the others who work here in the Twin Cities Office of the National Weather Service along with me as I mentioned Rich determine who will also be talking with folks who work here at the weather service will be learning a bit about the equipment that is used including the radar will be going to the top of the building to take a look at the clouds and see what John graph can tell us about the cloud cover for today in the Twin Cities. Are you at 11 o'clock in Minneapolis? St. Paul 61 degrees Fahrenheit 16 degrees Celsius 69% is the relative humidity and the winds were from the Northwest and you'll be getting lots of weather information today for about the next hour and a half. They'll be news headlines at 12 o'clock as usual and at about twelve ten the new book by Ruth BB. He'll hunt to yo is reviewed by Ron libertas from the Department of Natural Resources. That's at about twelve ten today on midday at 11:45 and again at about 12:15 will be at the National Weather Service talking with the folks here. Thank you very much Alan Cyril. We're on the third floor of the FAA building here in Suburban Minneapolis with John graph meteorologist in charge of the Twin Cities Office of the National Weather Service standing by and John. I can't think of a more appropriate person to give the weather forecast for our region. Just as soon as I give some temperatures here 60 degrees Fahrenheit in the Twin Cities at 11 o'clock with a west wind gusting to 22 miles per hour a cloudy Sky cloudy and Alexandria 54° showers in Duluth and Superior 53 cloudy at Hibbing and 52 in the Redwood Falls area partly sunny and 67 degrees. Let's hope they're enjoying that weather and we have a little problem here with Rochester. They're giving us a very strange information. (00:02:37) Well, they're 999 right now. (00:02:40) That's right a little garbled there, but we'll get back to Rochester rain in st. Cloud 54 degrees at looks to be one of the coolest temperatures around our region right now in Chicago partly sunny 67 mostly sunny in the Fargo-Moorhead area 61 degrees. Sioux Falls has a clear sky 69 Ly sunny at Des Moines and 73 for one of the warmer temperature readings cloudy at Eau Claire 59 partly sunny at lacrosse 63 degrees. Well now John graph. What can you tell us about the oh, here's Rochester partly sunny and 64 degrees. So that all those numbers meant that correct that correct said garble on the regional round up. Now those temperatures we just read John will talk about where they came from and just a moment but what's the weather outlook for Minnesota? (00:03:20) Well, of course, I think we all realize that we run into a pattern that ended just about 24 hours ago of extremely heavy rains caused by pretty much of a major disturbance that move down over us and this major disturbance even this morning as we're looking at our weather charts now are up in the arrowhead region the center of that storm. The last part of it is up there the cold front extends southeastward down around the Chicago area turns back southwestward into the central plains, and there's a large massive area of heavy low cloud is extending all the way back into eastern North Dakota across most of Minnesota. I think our listeners right here in the Twin Cities. Metropolitan area can look out now and see part of this low gray band of cloud as we're looking at it. Now if we were down the extreme Southwest part of the state, we had see some sunny skies down there. We're also looking at the satellite picture that indicates about the same and we're recovering just very very slowly from this massive disturbance. So it's really going to be much later this afternoon. And of course tonight and tomorrow till we start clearing these clouds out from our metropolitan area here and then finally up in the Northeast part of the state will start clearing lady later tomorrow. They're so weathers where we stand (00:04:28) weather system. You were just describing John on the map of Minnesota. It makes a sweeping curve to the west and covers the Red River Valley area into North Dakota. Doesn't it? (00:04:37) Yes, it certainly does and comes down catches a portion of extreme Northeastern South Dakota. And as we said most all of Minnesota certainly covers all of Wisconsin and right on over into the Great Lakes (00:04:48) states now you were talking about looking out the window and if somebody looked out their window right now in Minneapolis or st. Paul, what would you call the cloud stratocumulus? So our cumulus (00:04:56) congestus well in this particular case, I think we're looking at strata cumulus and just to bring your people up to date. Normally they congestus has to do with much more of a vertical motion and a rain shower activity. We have only very little remaining now and stratas of course is the solid gray form where you can't see any form to the cloud at all. So those are those are the differentiations of the three that you just (00:05:17) mentioned I would are looking at static you I looked for 15 minutes to throw those three terms at you and you did great (00:05:23) well done and this job offer we presented to you earlier this morning is still in the (00:05:27) offing. You're very kind your very kind standing right by your side is Ron Willis who I take it as your right-hand man here at the weather service and we'll be talking with Ron and just a bit about some questions related to weather data Gathering Rich demon will be with Ron. I was wondering John about these eleven o'clock readings. We just gathered here from the 5 state area. Where do these come from? (00:05:48) Well these come from our Weather Service offices and they come from the flight service stations from the Federal Aviation. It's Federal Aviation agency. That cooperate with us and we with them because I think it must be remembered that there are specializations in weather forecasting and there are organizations both federal and state that we cooperate with and it's very interesting that you mention this because the flight service station in this regard are feeding us information and we're feeding forecast back through the system for Aviation purposes. If we had a very very dry day today, we might be working with Department of Natural Resources or state climatology with Earl keenness to will be with us little bit later today. If we were looking at an air pollution situation, we had a stagnant situation overs right now and had air pollution would be working with the Minnesota Pollution Control agency. So the National Weather Service in reality is an organization that is working with all elements of state and federal (00:06:39) government John, I grew up in an era when you were called the weather bureau and then not too long ago. I guess the name was changed to the Weather Service. I guess. I was reading this morning that about 1940 the weather bureau was in the US Department of Agriculture, and I guess that was from about 1890. He won and then pre 1891 the signal Corps operated a government Weather Service of sorts. So the weather service has come a long way, (00:07:04) but we certainly come a long way. You know, when we go back to the Civil War era when President Grant signed of the Proclamation he knew there was a great deal of sickness out on the Frontiers and Frontier and he told his Surgeon General at that time to let us see if the weather doesn't have something to do with this. So he had the army take observations. The signal Corps did the transmission on this work and the surgeons that were in the field of that time would make comparison reports of whether as versus our health. So it's very (00:07:30) interesting. Yeah, and when I heard about some of the early attempts to gather weather information, I noted that medical doctors seem to be prominent because in some cases you mentioned they were active in the Civil War out in the field and they were logical ones to take a look at weather conditions. I have the impression John that early on in weather forecasting most of the people who were involved in it were amateurs or dabblers. You might say people sort of watching weather conditions where their own (00:07:55) pleasure. Well, you know in this particular case some of those that we might today consider as amateurs. We find their records were very very good. I hate to use that word amateur in reality many of these people kept pace with a known technology of the times was hardly rank them as amateurs. And even today we have people who are dedicated to have their own weather stations and take observations and help support us as feel spotters and they're far from being amateurs in this case and I have a great deal of respect for the work that they do and they're totally dedicated and even the people in our sister agencies that work with us to take observations for us and and help us in this regard. Also do not qualify as a matured very professional in their (00:08:34) work. Finally John you're called a meteorologist and I'm curious about the difference between a meteorologist and a weather forecaster say, (00:08:43) well, it is much like saying I am a doctor. However, I specialize in the particular area of Cardiology. It's much the same if we wanted to use a simple analogy in this case, and of course more certainly we have meteorologist and we have hydrologist. We have climatologists as such but the basic background all has to do with meteorology or the science and study of the (00:09:03) atmosphere John. We're going to be taking a look at some of the equipment. You have a rate about you here. We're in the a foster. Oh my God, I understand and we'll be talking about that a bit later in midday today about 1215 and we have lots of equipment television screens that are not carrying the soap operas at all. They're carrying a pictures of the Upper Midwest and of the entire I guess of the entire Western hemisphere has not effect the northern hemisphere the whole Northern Hemisphere. (00:09:28) Your being is being observed at this present time. If we look over here at the central scope, we're looking all the way out Beyond Hawaii and up into the Aleutian chain and we can almost see Japan there. We're now looking down at the central part of it right into the United States and out into the Central and North Atlantic and we're looking as far south as the northern sections of South America. So in all our pictures that we're seeing here today at different levels in the atmosphere are describing those particular features of temperatures and wind and And particular weather activities that are taking place in a broad scope terje with the north-central portion of the northern hemisphere of being in the central part of that picture. So we like to take the broad scope view of what is (00:10:07) happening and we'll get some more information about what use that data is put to from Rich deep and rich. Thank you Dan. And as we said a moment ago, Ron Willis is also with us this morning and Ron what are some of the the applications of these reports and forecast someone here is just putting a pile of very thin paper down on a table and those papers have what I imagined our facsimile printouts of what's on these computer screens long flowing lines that we see on the weather map sometimes on television in the evening. What are some of the the applications as Dan said of these forecasts who will get these forecasts. Okay. First of all, the equipment that we're looking at here in our a Foss room as we call that our forecast room is built to eventually replace. Our teletypes and our facsimile machine. There is a be a tremendous saving of paperwork paper and the work associated with filing and hey and hanging the papers around so they can be used what the new system looks like is a series of TV tubes really that we can call up and display any piece of weather information that's now available on either the teletype for the facsimile. We gather information from not only all over the country. But from many areas of the world as John was saying we have a lot of information from all of the northern hemisphere is centering on the US we get information from all levels and really before we can make a weather forecast. We have to know what the weather conditions are at the present time. Therefore. We first of all look at the weather conditions as they are right now latest observations surface and upper air. Then we look at the charts and maps and messages that give us an indication of what the large-scale features of the atmosphere mail. Like in 1224 hours or two or three days for that matter are National meteorological Centre out in Washington DC has a large computer facility and this facility collects all the weather information certainly from the United States and all of the northern hemisphere a lot of worldwide information as well. And then the computers are able to not only display in map form the conditions as they now exist. But also to forecast ahead they'll again the large scale weather features at all levels of the atmosphere as to what the the various features should look like in the coming two or three days and then it's our job to take that information and refine it check it out use it as we see fit and then come up with are more localized forecast for Minnesota or the 5 state area or the Twin Cities. So it's a whole lot more than Simply Having Observer go out into an open area look up and take a look at the clouds and send to you the temperature and humidity readings. Things like that, right? This is the very important beginning point. So as I said, we have to have these good quality observations taken by Dependable people in order that we have something to base our forecasts on now a few minutes ago. Mr. Graff mentioned that if it were hot to dry clear day at the end of August, which it isn't that you might be working very closely with the Department of Natural Resources explain a little bit about what you might be doing with them on a day like that. Well, we do routinely para fire weather forecast twice a day for the DNR and for the u.s. Forest service to use also they're interested in some of the same weather parameters as the public is interested in such as a high temperatures the wind velocities, but they're also interested in some specifics such as the dew points which indicates the amount of moisture in the air relative humidities any specific areas that are expecting some high winds or wind shifts frontal system moving through the area that could cause a fire that may be burning. Or a planned burn could give the handlers of the fire some problems as the wind shifts in the front goes through many times were called upon to give a spot fire weather forecast. If there may be an ongoing fire or a plan prescribed burn we get the request for weather information for that particular location so that they know that it's not going to take out any more than they want when they set a fire right and it helps them in their planning purposes. If obviously we think it's going to rain in the afternoon on a prescribed burn that they had planned to do DNR for a service whatever the case may be. You may decide that to hold up the burn for that particular day and try it again tomorrow one last question here. And that is just how accurate can you be in a forecast. Generally it certainly the forecasts are getting better. We're getting better and better information out of our computers all the time. Also. Our forecasters have more time to spend on the the actual forecast itself rather than Spending a lot of time in the tearing and filing of paperwork and just the daily upkeep of the office. In other words, we're able to spend more time on the job that we're supposed to be doing that gives us more time to refine our thinking to sit down and give the forecast some thought and come up with a better product. There is a slow Improvement in the forecast and we're glad to see that. Okay, very good. Thanks. Ron Willis will be talking more with you later in the program right now. We're going to turn it back over to Dan Olson. Thanks. Ron enriched John. I was listening to the conversation and about the reliability of forecast information. And I know you must get lots and cards of letters. Maybe you can show us the cards and letters room from people who wonder why the Weather Service gank at the forecast, right? I remember reading that forecasts are prepared for about a two day period that is to say you really can't forecast very reliably more than two days ahead. Is that about the size of it (00:15:47) as far as specifics are concerned usually within the two-day period these specific elements for which people would like to make specific planning is normally available as a matter of fact, we're Even very very few cards most of what we have been receiving recently. It has gone beyond any point of criticism. It goes to the point. Now we see that you're able to provide this you're able to provide that we have our NOAA Weather Radio, which is set up for them. We're working closely with the public media such as you and television stations and other elements of the press and it has gone beyond this. There's been an acceptance of the short range accuracy. We're now striving for the same accuracy and the 325 day. And now that this is the real problem pinning down as specifically as we can for the public what's going to happen then then our next jump will be the 5 to 10 day outlook (00:16:30) will be back in about 15 minutes or so with John graph and Ron Willis and Earl Keen asked the state climatologist for a tour of the weather facilities here. Very modernistic looking Enterprise will be on top of the roof and we'll be in the other areas including the a father's room that we're in right now will be over by the NOAA radio system that John referred to in a couple of other locations a reminder that today's programming on Minnesota Public Radio is sponsored in part. By Susan and Paul Scheer, Alan Searle will be along with news headlines in just a moment. This is Minnesota Public Radio a listener supported service. Thank you very much Alan Cyril for the news and it will be joining you again at about 1250 core additional news headlines. I'm on the top of the roof of the FAA building here in Suburban Minneapolis, which is the roof of what is now the National Weather Service office and used to be a John graph explained to me a couple of minutes ago the old Passenger Terminal here at what was Wilt Chamberlain field at that time. I suppose (00:17:30) General that is correct all of the traffic the DC twos and the dc-3s and the other small aircraft have come in came to this terminal the building that we're standing on now used to house all of that traffic. And of course now is we're viewing from the roof here. We're looking across the other side and we see the massive expanse of the new terminal and its expansion and we wonder how did we ever do it here? (00:17:50) Yeah, I should say this is quite a bird's-eye view we have and we'll be talking about the view of some of the weather instrument equipment that we See not only right by our side but often the distance, we've got to get cracking on this portion of our midday program because it's 60 degrees or so Fahrenheit up here on the top of the roof and I suppose that's about 20 degrees Celsius or so, (00:18:10) that's approximately and of course with the wind blowing up here and no sunlight. It's pretty chilly (00:18:14) and you're in your shirt sleeves. Now the rest of Minnesota today can expect a cloudy sky with a few light showers in the north and clear or clearing skies in southern Minnesota this afternoon with highs in the 60s to the mid 70s tonight. It will be cloudy in the northeastern part of Minnesota and clear to partly cloudy over the rest of the state with low temperature readings tonight in the mid-40s North to the low and mid 50s in the South. So that's really pretty cool for this time of year and by tomorrow clear to partly cloudy and we should have highs tomorrow in the 60s to near 80 and I suppose that's in the South part of Minnesota. Now Twin Cities area residents today variable cloudiness with a chance of a brief sprinkle this afternoon. And in fact on the way out to the Weather Service building we had some some sprinkles and It'll be mostly sunny and warmer by tomorrow in the Twin Cities lows tonight in the mid-50s with highs this afternoon in the upper 60's to the mid 70s John were standing by what I called a little house on stilts and you called the instrument shelter. What's happening in (00:19:11) here? Well, of course, we have the measurement of our temperature maximum and minimum temperature that is housed in this little white box which runs about two or three feet in height and about two and a half feet and with it has louvers and it's painted white to reflect and it it's the faced away from the Sun so that we won't get any anomalous readings as far as our maximum and minimum temperatures and also in the shoulder. We have a high high growth armata, thermometric equipment that measures the amount of humidity and it's also backup equipment to our automated equipment that's on the (00:19:41) field because the automated equipment is the first line now and that but when you say automated what you mean, you mean you don't have to send a meteorologist out there did you greetings? And right now that is correct. Everything is remote (00:19:53) censored in this particular case. We're tied in directly with the aviation activity were Seeing as far as Runway temperature and also we have sensing for the Ambient Air Temperature, which is well protected how much moisture is falling that is measured as well. The sunshine recorders. What are we getting as far as insulation, which is incoming solar radiation the wind direction wind speed the wind gust all that is measured by the automatic equipment remoted directly back to us. All (00:20:17) right. Well this little white shelter that we're standing next to is one that I think a lot of people are familiar with because it is the sort of shelter that we have seen in many locations at agricultural experiment stations in people's backyards for that matter, but half a mile away. We have an example of quite a different form of information gathering equipment. It looks to me John like a water tower, but of course, it's radar. (00:20:40) That's right. That's the radar Tower with a big dome or shelter around it. And as we look over there, of course, we see a tower that's running about approximately 85 to 90 feet in height. And on top of that. There's a big globular Dome white with the red lights flashing on top for aircraft identification, so that I can say it and looks kind of small from here but we went over there they could put about six of us in there and we could stand up very comfortably and that has a big rotating dish that's going around which is the antenna inside the housing (00:21:08) John is just the famous weather radar that we hear so much about and see so much of on television screens. (00:21:14) This is basically true one of the station's of course here in the metropolitan area does have a drop on our radar number of the airlines are taking drops from the National Weather Service radar now and through the good Services of the people who are transmitting this Forest they can to get the very color picture what we're seeing the different intensity levels the movement of Storms and we want the people to have an opportunity to see exactly what we're seeing (00:21:36) here. How far out does that radar go about a hundred twenty five (00:21:39) miles or effective range for some of the smaller showers down 225 225. This is a network radar ever with 250 mile range capability that can see the tops of the very high thunderstorms that are above 40,000 feet so we can actually see thunderstorms in the extreme. Turn that Dakotas or way up along the Canadian United States border or down into Iowa or all sometimes almost over to Lake Michigan to the (00:22:04) east When you mention you can see a thunderstorm over by Eastern North Dakota. Would you cooperate with the meteorologist for example at the airport in Fargo to help them detect whether (00:22:14) we certainly would because they're getting the very close view of that storm cell over there. We're getting the more distant view of it as well. And there's something to be said for perspective and when we view it from different directions and distances we can get much more information from that reading (00:22:27) and I suppose somebody in Duluth for example might help out here in the Twin Cities. Is that right? It's very true because (00:22:33) at Duluth and our Weather Service office we have what is called a local radar wsr. 74c. We also have these at different locations like Rochester to the South are called Gap filler Radars. And this is for the protection of the local public in that area. So our network is a very generous one now and we're getting excellent (00:22:50) coverage. We should be very well covered. Well briefly before we track down stairs and thaw out from the 60 degree temperature of Let's take a look at the clouds that we were talking about earlier now John if you were to try to advise somebody on how to predict whether by just looking at Clouds, could you just look up and give me some hint as to what we might expect for this afternoon into this evening and (00:23:12) tomorrow. All right fine, of course right here in the metropolitan area if we looked out and we knew the fact we now have the basic West Winds and Northwest winds that are coming in and we know we have a strata cumulus type of cloud. We know that we have had a frontal passage and this is true. The front is now over east of Us near Lake Michigan going up to a low in northeastern Minnesota as far as the braking and clearing is concerned as we right now stand and look down the Southwest. We see it much brighter in the southwest and not so bright up to the Northeast and this means from our satellite photography that we have seen that the edge of that particular storm system over on now is gradually clearing over Southwestern Minnesota and by very late afternoon or evening. We'll see good breaks in the clouds here. Is that clearing begins to work up our way (00:23:54) so really you can tell quite a bit from just looking The clouds clouds and wind direction we can tell a great deal from that. Well, we'll be taking another look at the clouds but in a slightly different fashion in a few minutes because right now we are going to go down to the radar facility the a foster home and a couple of other stops along the way in your facility and rich diekman is standing by to talk with some of the folks down there rich. Thank you very much, Dan. And as you say I am in the radar room here at the weather service and it is a room with no windows and a half of it is enclosed with a curtain which is used to shut out what light leaks in from the door and a small desk lamp and behind that curtain is Dwayne O'Malley who right now is plotting what appear to be clouds and perhaps clouds that have precipitation in them. He seated in front of the radar display screen, which I suppose is about a foot in diameter. So and he's drawing lines and irregular as straight lines as well as irregular lines on the surface of the screen and he is taking Things and generally I believe plotting out what our weather is around the region and I wonder mr. O'Malley if I can just step in here for a minute and ask you what you have on your screen right now. Well right at this time, we have some showers generally quite light but showers scattered across this part of Minnesota into Western Wisconsin running from roughly the same Cloud area across Western and northern part of the Twin Cities metropolitan area and over to about auclair a few minutes ago. John graph told an Olsen Up on the Roof after they took a look at the clouds told him that things should be clearing out from the Northwest. Is that hold as far as what you have on your screen here. Basically, yes, the area showers is ending at least as far as we can see with the radar at this point to the northwest of us and Just coming into the in across the metropolitan area right now. Mr. O'Malley in addition to the radar screen that you have in front of you which displays the clouds that have precipitation in them. You're also using something that appears to be a graph here that goes up to 70 on in numbers and I see a below it it says height and thousands of feet and every once in a while you turn some dials in addition to looking at the graph or the read out in front of you. You also are checking something on that height reading and I wonder what what that's all about. Well, we're constantly checking the height of the precipitation Echoes that we're showing actually the radar does not display clouds so much as precipitation falling from the clouds. Other words in general most fair weather clouds will chew up on the radar because there's not enough moisture in them as far as what the radar is designed to detect. So what you're doing here is checking out how far up in the clouds the precipitation goes. That's correct. Okay. Thanks very much. I know that you have some work to do and so we'll let you get to that. Ron Willis is also with me and John graph now to in the radar room here and this this room was a whole lot more hectic about six weeks ago a one evening. I was out here in late or mid-july and we had some very severe thunderstorms moving down across Southwestern and Western Minnesota Anand to near Mankato and this room really seem to be the Hub of activity and I wonder mr. Graff and mr. Willis if you'd tell me a little bit about what goes on in severe weather and if indeed this is really the Hub of activity and during that time (00:27:31) almost certainly has its kind of like the master command post or the as they used to say in the military the combat information. It's the center for the very fact that we are looking at the radar scope constantly. We have communications via the national are warning system so that we can talk to each one of our people our spotters and Command Post in each one of the counties that may be affected. And essentially we are doing two things electromagnetically through radar. We are detecting where the severe storms are located and checking on their intensities and movements. (00:28:03) We are now, excuse me, when you say electromagnetically you mean with the radar (00:28:07) that is correct with the radar that's electromagnetic detection with radar and then we are confirming what we are seeing on radar with our spotters in the field. Sometimes as an example of many tornado is so small that radar cannot see a tornado as such a very small one. We do tell the people in the field in the affected counties that we have a situation that is becoming stronger and it looks like it has potential for severe weather that spotted in the field then we'll actually look at the cloud and make an open line. Hall to us here at the National Weather Service and we use the Open Line information to look at the radar and listen to the trainspotters report at the same time so that we can get positive identification of the elements that are being (00:28:48) viewed. Now that evening that I was here. I remember that you were standing over right about where I am next to a phone and you didn't do any dialing you simply said Mankato warning point and they would come on the line seconds later. And then you would talk to them. That's the system that you're talking about the individual spotters in the (00:29:04) field that particular system were talking about that is the command center that goes out via the national are warning system where it is a hotline through the auspices and help of the highway patrol or the patrol here in the state of Minnesota will help us in their communication centers. They will then fan out from a one of the center's out in the field to one of the counties and they assist us tremendously in the holding together the whole Communications process. So we not only have the straight telephone line, but the national are warning system and the course the national are warning system is the very system we would use in the case of nuclear attack. So we're constantly checking that system day in and day out (00:29:40) run Willis. I was amazed that evening that I was out here. I was sitting next to the radar display screen and the man on duty at that time was was able to manipulate the wand if you will the line that sweeps around and stop it and send it back and almost Plumb the depths of the clouds and he seem to locate the one very intense thunderstorm cell which spotters had reported a tornado that tornado was in that cell tell me a little bit about how that works back to the radar. Well, generally there are several things that we look at when we're studying our radar return as to the potential of severe weather one thing as you were mentioning that the antenna can be stopped and the clouds can be scanned vertically one of the things we look for for potential for severe weather in a particular thunderstorm is the height of the tops of that thunderstorm Cloud once the tops get up quite High to 30 35 or 40 thousand feet or higher. We recognize the fact that that cloud that storm does have the potential for producing high winds large hail and certainly a tornado we look at other things. We look at the intensity of the echo return. We have six levels that we can look at and see on the scope on the radar screen we can we can cancel out the the lower levels and just be looking at say the level five or six is if we want and just see exactly where that particular storm cell is. Another thing we look at is the speed of movement of the cell a very slow-moving sell normally would not produce strong winds large hail, although it could produce locally heavy rains and maybe it's a little bit of flooding generally movement 30 miles an hour or faster. We start to look at again the potential for producing severe weather. Now that evening that I was here. There was a tornado on the ground that was moving from the Northwest toward Mankato and a Warning was issued for Mankato and then spotters were out in the field. And as I recall they were reporting in here and telling us where that tornado was and it turned out that it passed to the north of Mankato and then as it got darker and closer on into the evening, it seemed to dissipate somewhat at least and then we all went home or at least I did and as I was pulling in my front driveway, I heard the sirens go off and that meant that the tornado warning had been issued for at least part of the metropolitan area. What happened there John (00:32:07) graph in that particular situation the whole series for which we had been for which we had watch is issued and warnings throughout the entire day. Finally culminated as it passed around the Twin Cities metropolitan area in the formation of a very very small mini tornado down the extreme Southeastern sections of the Twin Cities area and this very very small mini tornado. I believe affected three or four homesteads as such in the area before it lift it up very very small about. Oh, I would say no more than the 30 to 50 feet across as far as its total circulatory path is concerned then right back up into the clouds. Once again, this is why often times when they have very very strong thunderstorms will also indicate on the end of that warning message that small tornadoes can form and when you were on your way home at that particular time the atmosphere after his whole day of doing is very destructive thing finally gave one last gasp and put one small mini tornado down as an ending or a funny to the situation that evening. (00:33:04) Now those tornadoes are tough for you to see from this this claws, aren't they with the sophisticated equipment. How do you how do you go about detecting them other than getting reports from spotters (00:33:14) while in this particular case, they are extremely hard to see because one cloud form itself in dimension on the radar might have a size that you can work with, but the circulation of a tornado is almost like a little pin prick or a real small pin head size on some of these mini tornadoes and you do not know whether you're seeing a mini tornado or not and this particular case unless they have Characteristic big hook Echo and normally that's not the case. (00:33:40) So sometimes sometimes you call on Rochester or Duluth. Don't you in their radar to kind of help out and take a scan of what's so close to us here in the Twin Cities that we can't see it. Clearly (00:33:51) that's very true will use this as an aid and by 2 or even sometimes three radar stations looking at it. Sometimes you can pick up those characteristics by radar but we must remember that the cooperation of the state serves Emergency Services Division and the local police and the highway patrol and all the other agencies that cooperate with us they have and we have trained spotters in the field that report to us immediately by the same methods we reported before so often times, even though it's closed in we don't have to be entirely dependent upon the radar itself the good Services the people we cooperate with often give us as much warning as a radar would or better (00:34:26) run Willis long before we get a tornado warning. We usually are under something called a tornado watch or severe thunderstorm watch trace the steps for me from A time that a tornado or thunderstorm watch is posted right on through and the kinds of things that you would be doing here where you would be plotting it. There's a map behind us. I know that was used the night. I was here the couple of nights that I was here. Where does it usually start from? Okay the severe thunderstorm or tornado watch. These are issued by the national severe storm forecast Center in Kansas City. They have responsibility for the entire United States for issuing the watches and the watches are nothing more than a large area where the potential for severe thunderstorms or tornadoes either exist or more likely will exist for the next several hours. Normally, they cover an area of about a hundred and twenty miles wide to about 250 miles long a long and 60 miles either side of a line from we've heard that quite often and usually for several hours maybe a six hour period 4 p.m. To 10 p.m. Coming evening. Again. This outlines the area of potential there may not be You thunderstorms in that area when the watch is issued. This is the first indication by our forecasters in Kansas City that the atmosphere does have a lot of potential for severe storms for the coming afternoon or evening. We of course all the time would be following any storms that we have in the area within 250 miles the limit of our radar we would be following them on radar and also monitoring the radar observations from other stations around the area. We actually have statewide responsibility for weather in the state of Minnesota and for severe weather we cover a large portion of the Southern half of Minnesota. So we have quite a large area of responsibility at any rate. Once the watch is issued. We of course then determine the delineation of that watch in our state and issue that to the general public and to all the interested agencies to get the first word that yes, the potential is there and we must now be on our toes and be advised that there. Could be some warnings as we get on into the watch period I think one thing to note with the watch concept is that the watch box could also be known as a time box as we say if that area that watch area is oriented more from Southwest to Northeast. The general movement of severe storms is from Southwest to Northeast. Generally, then if this box is valid say for six hours and we're way up in the Northeast side of that door end of that box somewhere. We would think that well the progression normally Southwest to Northeast we would have to be more concerned with severe weather toward the end of the time period whereas persons in the southwestern portion of that box a little earlier again, just another way to use that watch concept of if you are a member of the public and trying to figure out what it's trying to tell you and then when a warning is issued, I know at least for the metropolitan area. I was here one of those evenings when a warning was issued in the somebody after it was determined that maybe I should ask you to tell me how it Determine how it is determined that a warning should be issued for a particular area depending on whether it's severe thunderstorm or tornado. Of course again, we look at the radar to get an idea of the cloud top Heights the speed of movement. We look at the radio radar intensity Return of the echo. We look at the the electric electric properties of the storm. For instance. We have a device here called a Spirits device which detects the intensity of lightning in a particular storm. We can tell whether that lightning intensity is increasing or decreasing or holding its own or whether it's high or low. We put all this together as a first yes as to what kind of potential we think that storm has. We also use any spotter reports that we might get of any wins or hail that are occurring many times that we do issue the warnings. Just based on what we're seeing on radar and S various device. Would it warning ever be issued completely on the base? Service Potter report, we would always take a look at that area on our radar because it does happen that the report may be a few minutes old maybe by that time since we know that these cumulonimbus clouds are increasing and decreasing intensity at all times. We like to take a look at it at the present time and see what it looks like. Okay. Thanks very much. Run Willis. We're in the radar room and Dan Olson is at another spot here at the Weather Service. He is at the broadcast Booth of the NOAA Weather Radio where many of the watches all of the watches and warnings in addition to regular weather information are broadcast from Dan, right Rich. Thanks to you and to John and Ron for telling us a little bit about the radar room. Not too many people know that the National Weather Service operates a small radio Empire and there's really only one frequency in the format is very monotonous, but very informative to people who are whether addicts with me right now is Rich Kessler who is meteorological technician and one of the people who works with the NOAA radio. System Rich, what does Noah mean (00:39:38) National (00:39:39) oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration now this little radio system that we're talking about is one where people get a continuous Radio Service and the service is whether information is and right. That's correct. The same things that we offer when you call on the (00:39:53) telephone easier to get a hold of by listening to the radio (00:39:57) now people who want to listen into this Weather Radio Service can buy receivers that receive only this frequency. That's correct. They can buy small radios ranging from ten to Fifteen (00:40:08) dollars up to maybe 40 or $50 or sometimes AM/FM radios also have a weather band (00:40:16) and we're looking at the equipment right now that handles the cartridges which contain the continuous Loops of magnetic tape under which is recorded the weather information. So if somebody sits down in this chair in front of us and opens that microphone rich in just reads the weather information in yes, that's correct. Now, what is the process in the event of a watch or a warning what happens then? (00:40:36) Well, if it's for a local area first we get in contact with local and state police departments. The next thing that's done is we go over and hit a tone alert on the weather radio set which alerts the media and alerts people who have these weather radio such as schools and hospitals things like that and alerts them at there's going to be an important message of 11 type of or another (00:41:00) and then finally to the teletype machines to type it out to the various teletype machines and radio and TV stations. For example, yes, that's correct. So actually this Weather Service radio is second in line to get notice of a warning for example, so people who have these receivers would probably know about severe weather before they would hear it on any other kind of broadcast service. Yes, that's true. It's almost instantaneous within a (00:41:27) matter of seconds from the (00:41:28) time. We issue a warning till people would hear it. And the service is offered around the state of Minnesota. You were telling me earlier you have about almost 100% coverage of the state of Minnesota for the population. That's true in the major metropolitan areas major cities. So there are you could receive for example this radio service in st. Cloud Duluth and Southeastern Minnesota. What about the Southwest (00:41:54) I believe there's there's plans for implementing one in the southwestern part of the state. It's also available throughout the country nationally. (00:42:00) All right, that's rich Kessler who was a meteorological technician and operates helps operate the NOAA radio service for the National Weather Service. Thanks Rich, and I'm standing by the NOAA radio service, which is adjacent to the aphis room. Where is where that room is where we began today's midday broadcast and it's one of the places where we're going to wind it up because the a Foss room seems to be the center of activity for much of what happens here at the Federal Aviation Administration Building at the International Airport grounds and National Weather Service has its Offices here the room the a Foss room is ringed by video screens with a couple of desks right in the center. Rich diekman is right in the center of all that all of that activity with a couple of people rich. Thank you Dan. I'm standing next to Bob Gustafson who is drawing some lines on some maps here in front of himself, and I'm wondering Bob if you could explain very briefly. What what you're doing right now. Well, this is a (00:42:57) for Section map here. The the first panel has your vorticity which gives you your possibility of of clouds and precipitation both. The next second panel is a locations of your highs and lows at this (00:43:14) specific verification (00:43:16) time of 7 p.m. This evening. The third panel has your your moisture Supply 90 percent 70 percent the Shaded area here at and tells where it is in relation to your State's location. (00:43:32) And so these are all would all be used you would use these to help put together forecasts. (00:43:37) Yes, you do. They're very helpful. They extend into this this certain chart here now, we'll go into Early Sunday, so it's about a two day (00:43:49) outlook. What does it tell us for early Sunday? Just briefly. Well, look at this last chart here (00:43:56) 7 a.m. On Sunday. You have a certain supply of moisture a 70% area over the northern part of the state as you can see here and the provinces of Canada which would indicate just a possibility if you had the other ingredients that you could get precipitation in the (00:44:11) north. So there's a chance of rain on Sunday at least in the northern part of Minnesota (00:44:16) it would appear so, yes, (00:44:17) sir. Okay. Thanks very much. Bob Gustafson. We're moving around the various display terminals. There are eight of them here and is Dan described him earlier. They look somewhat like television screens only instead of the soap operas. There are displays of in one case the Northern Hemisphere and other the five state region with lines that are flowing lines that are linked together that appear to be a by lines of equal pressure and with John graph here. John has joined us again is the State climatologist Earl Keen asked. Mr. Keane s thanks for being with us this afternoon. Thank you. Appreciate it. One of the things that that we hear from time to time about weather forecasting is that it isn't all done with with very sophisticated electronic equipment of the kind that we have in front of us here, but that some of it at least is done with the simple numbers numbers that have been gathered over many many years and are used to give people like the people here at the Weather Service some idea of Trends where we are in the different trends of weather. How are some of those statistics gathered and how are they applied to weather forecasting? Those statistics themselves are gathered from our Cooperative Network and their compiled and computed down at Asheville North Carolina. Our national records Center. We also have some are we call smaller type networks fine mesh, which we have in precipitation across the state now going back and looking at this data the main thing that we want to look at it for and his two more or less tell not only the weather service but also the people or the public as a whole where do we stand in other words? How do we how do we compare to past data? Are we in trouble aren't we in so many words good example is this year are looking at the phonology of the crop? Well, you know, we got started about a week to two weeks late in our planning. We've looked at that and we've looked at this back for about 14 years and we find that this year where one of the latest that has been in the last 14 years 1965 was a very light year and we're very close to paralleling that and using the meteorological data and comparing it. We can look ahead and say well if we stay normal or we stay like 1965, where do we end up with certain crops in the sense of maturity dates and that's what we've done this year. So that in addition to telling John graph and his staff about those kinds of things farmers obviously would be very interested in that information as well as people who are who are involved in the Commodities markets and people who are involved in transportation people who might be wanting to have boxcars in a particular place at a particular time all of those things. Yes, all of this AIDS somewhere in the agricultural field. I'm sure there are other areas in Your business at make very good use of these types of analysis. Now, you mentioned a reporting Network and then a fine mesh network of what what tell me a little bit about that and where exactly you get the statistics from we have a really there's seven networks of the different types of cross the state. They're rather most of them are sponsored by particular organization and you know, the national weather service has their basic Network which we call a co-op network, which we've had for many many years here in the Twin Cities. We have three networks that we get data from what more or less a byproduct from that Network the mosquito control has a summertime Network which they watched the (00:48:03) know the conditions for (00:48:04) mosquitoes the we started one. We call a backyard rain gauge Network volunteer group. Another group is a KSTP Network, which you see Out State the FFA or the education department has started a network back in 71 which still continues we have started another one with all the soil Water Conservation District Network. And then the DNR for Street District Foresters have a network. So putting all of these together. We have a lot of weather data from real small areas and what we're finding in this area particularly in one of the studies we done here in the Twin Cities that there are wetter areas and others give you an example of the airport out here is rather dry. If we look at the summer rain falls, we done a 14-year study. We find that it's to get more than five inches of every summer here at I should say it Minnetonka then you do here at the airport out in east of st. Paul. There's another wet spot about four inches more every summer than you have right here in Bloomington or Richfield here with the airport is so it gives you some sense then. To just how on a very micro scale if I can say that how the wide variations in weather that we have. Yes, and then another point I think probably the operational use we make of that is flash floods right now the flash flood we had down in South Martin County. We call these networks up and we've been able to spot this network right now with it the flash flood area and of course then this also goes to the civil defense people who can make a judgment from their of of the how wide this area of damage excessive. It may be not only from the amount of rain, but by correlating this information to say the highway department for Highway damage to to the agricultural people how much damage to crops have we had from flooding all the way through Dan Olson has joined us here in the a Foss room. And along with Miss turkey nest and mr. Graff and Dan I'm wondering if we have may be given a bit of short shrift to the electronics here in the a Foss room. We talked a little bit about statistics and the work that the climatologists and his his networks that do perhaps we could spend a few minutes talking about these forecasts units here. Right rich. I was noticing over in the other side of the faucet area meteorological technician Rich Kessler was sitting by a machine that he was showing us with weather information and crop information from all parts of the United States and I was curious about the display on that particular terminal and Ron Willis of the National Weather Service know something about that Ron that information that we now see on Terminal screens used to come over you old teletype machines any of those teletype machines are still in use, of course around the country. I imagine this is much faster now, right again, this new equipment is going to replace all of our teletypes and all of our map reproducing Chains are right. Now we've got some of the new and some of the old here we're experimenting and testing the new equipment here and using an operationally as we can and of course the older equipment we're using as standby and back up and as necessary, but slowly but surely we're progressing to a new equipment eventually all the other officers in the country will have this new type of equipment that time will make the complete shift who is interested in the state of the date harvest in California or wherever in the Citrus conditions in Florida, especially up in our area of the Midwest who might be interested in that sort of information you say who is interested, right? Well good question. I've been in California and I know those people are extremely interested in any time. They get rain on the raisins or Frost in any of their fruit orchards or anything like this, but at any rate, I guess you're asking why that information is available on our system and the way it turns out there is a central database out in Washington that collects all the information and makes it available to any station that wants to request the data out of the system so that if we do get a special request for instance from a member of the public or a user that is interested or has some interest in the fruit crop in California or whatever the case may be we can request this out of the system and have it at our fingertips and give that person the information. I know the weather that we've been having this summer has been a curiosity to a lot of people because 60 degrees Fahrenheit at noon in the Twin Cities in the end of August seems to me to be a little bit cool for this time of year, and I've heard it said that we have legitimate. One era of weather activity that was pretty unstable for the last 20 years or so. We may be entering another era of weather activity. That might be more stable. I'm curious State climatologist Earl Keen us what you think about the outlook for the next 20 years or so for weather and our region are we indeed cooling off? I don't think anybody can tell us exactly what's going to happen and that area our state-of-the-art ISM advance to that point at all. And so the people who are saying that we might be entering a period of cooler climate simply are not able to pinpoint it that accurately thing. I haven't seen anything and that I would put my hopes on Dan. Let me jump in here. Let let me ask on a much more short-term basis John graph. I'm curious to know if our summer is over (00:53:42) with We went up on that roof again. I think we had felt like it is I really feel not. You know Earl and I were talking about earlier as we always do about climatology and of course climatology and statistics are made up of extremes not averages we try and remember when we had an average day. I can't remember one. Can you Earl and when we look at the shorter-term vagaries of the weather such as 457 days of rainy cool weather, we often times find that preceded and or followed by warmer drier weather and it's these big curves and when we add all of these statistics together we get these average this is we're talking about but what Earl and I were talking about and what we're trying to do is try and find out in the longer run when expectations or continuations of these extremes can be expected so we can apply them and that's called applied climatology and Earl and I did this in the drought the 1976 when we saw these patterns were going to hold on be dry and we were able to indicate to the people in the state for their safety get fires were going to occur. The state is going to be dry and we can apply it and this is what Earl and I continue to work on hoping to break down the Curves within the vagaries rather than the long term. (00:54:47) All right, John graph and Earl Keen s that's a brief look at the aphis room and some of the other facilities here at the National Weather Service. The time is about nine minutes before one o'clock. We'll be back here at the National Weather Service building in about eight minutes or so first. Here's Allen Cyril with a brief summary of news headlines Alan. Thank you, Alain. Soral here's a look at the Minnesota forecast for today Cloudy with a few light showers in the north and clear or clearing skies in the South today and it better start clearing pretty soon because here in the Twin Cities at least it's still pretty heavily overcast highs this afternoon will be in the 60's to the mid 70s tonight cloudy and Northeastern Minnesota and clear to partly cloudy over. The rest of the state lows will be in the mid-40s North to the low and mid 50s in the South by tomorrow. It should be clear to partly cloudy and a bit warmer with highs in the 60s to near 80 now for the Twin Cities this afternoon variable cloudiness with a chance of a brief sprinkle this afternoon with a high in the upper 60s to near 70 tonight. A fair sky is predicted for the metropolitan area with a low in the low 50s. It'll be mostly sunny by Saturday in the Twin Cities area with highs in the mid to Upper 70s. We want to thank all of the folks at the National Weather Service John graft meteorologist in charge and with him Ron Willis Earl Keen a state climatologist. Also, Bob Gustafson, Wayne O'Malley and Rich Kessler technical director for today's broadcast was Tom Keith with assistance from Lynn Crews Linda, Marie and David Schneider production assistants were Chris Nelson and Marlene ruber. Thanks to Alan Cyril for preparing the newscasts along with Rich determine. This is Dan Olson, and that's midday for this week. You can hear midday again next Monday morning beginning at 11:30.