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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: July 16th, 2023

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  • My science falls more on the mesosphere/stratosphere side from space weather effects (top down rather than bottom up). However, SSW events are fascinating phenomena and have profound impacts on potentially all layers of the atmosphere. I’m currently developing (with lots of help) a high-top forecasting model that extends from the surface to the thermosphere. Forecasting SSW events are something we are hoping to improve with this model having a fully resolved mesosphere. I’ll edit my original post as I was hard on your article. I’ll also DM you my email and we can chat further.



  • I don’t disagree with its usefulness as a potential predictor once it is formed. I’ve seen the literature on its impact on NAO and the AO. This is particularly true following sudden stratospheric warming events and its correlation with cold air outbreaks in the NH. However claiming that it is “weak” is misleading since it hasn’t formed yet. And to my knowledge, the physical mechanism of the interaction between the stratospheric polar vortex and the tropospheric jet has not been determined. We think it is related to wave reflection from planetary wave and gravity waves during a sudden stratospheric warming event. But if we don’t understand the mechanism, forecast or climate models are incapable of predicting them since that physics will not be included in the models. At this point, using the jet stream in the stratosphere (the unformed vortex) as a predictor for the NH winter will not be better than climatology.



  • I work in the middle atmosphere and several things in this article I disagree with. First off, the polar vortex is a stratospheric and mesospheric jet stream that exists in the winter time. There is no polar vortex in the stratosphere during the summer. Let me repeat that. There is no polar vortex in the northern hemisphere right now! So how are you using it for predictions? Second, the media stole the term “polar vortex” for the Arctic jet stream that exists in the troposphere. Moreover, while correlations have been made (see Baldwin et al., 2021) on the stratospheric impact on the tropospheric weather, the physics aren’t well understood. Assuming you can make predictions on the northern hemisphere winter based on the polar vortex in the stratosphere (which again, doesn’t exist yet because it is summer) months out is unlikely.

    Edit: I edited out the argument that the OP may not reputable since they are a meteorologist in Canada.

    Edit2: I’ve edited my original post slightly after discussing this concept with the OP.



  • This is insanity. Voting sites should be under the control of the federal government and run by nonpartisan commissions. States and especially not some county courthouse should have no control over whether or not a polling site exists. Polling sites should be based on population density regardless of voter turnout and Election Day should be a national holiday where everyone has the opportunity and ability to vote locally. All of this should be written into the constitution. This is pure voter suppression and anyone attempting this should be charged.



  • “It doesn’t join NATO, it doesn’t join some of these sort of allied institutions,” Mr. Vance said. “I think that’s ultimately what this looks like.”

    Elbridge Colby, one of Trumps simps from the Pentagon had this to add:

    “Senator Vance is being realistic and putting out forthrightly a realistic basis for ending the conflict,” he said, “while other people are engaged in a kind of irresponsible fantasy.”

    Imagine being asked to give up a significant piece of your nations territory, while being refused any security guarantees in the future. This is after your children have been raped and stolen and your land destroyed. This is what peace looks like? Fuck off both of you. If you let nations like Russia to steal land and get away with it, they won’t stop. Of course, we know Trump and Vance are puppets of Putin so no real surprises here. After all, we know how much dictators love trump.


  • I’m a scientist who is contracted through NASA and work at one of the NASA facilities. As an early career scientist, working here is a dream job. I get the opportunity to work with absolute world class scientists everyday. That said, the funding situation is dire at all NASA facilities due to funding cuts. The current saying is “flat is the new up” in terms of funding. That means if NASA maintains its funding, it’s a win. As a result, NASA would rather maintain science and engineering with the limited budget, but at the expense of the facilities themselves. I can attest that it is a stark difference between someplace like the Applied Physics Lab at Hopkins (lots of military contracts) vs Goddard Space Flight Center in terms of the quality of the facilities.

    The problem is Congress looks for funding cuts in discretionary funding. Mandatory funding consists of social security, healthcare, and veteran programs. Discretionary funding is everything else, which makes up only roughly 25% of the rest of the budget. Military takes half of the discretionary budget. Democrats nor Republicans dare to touch the military budget despite the fact they fail their audit every single year. This leaves 900 billion for everything else. NASA gets about 4% of that.

    Since the tax code is totally fucked up in this country, the richest people pay the least percentage through loopholes and corporations barely pay anything (9% of the total revenue), it’s up to the working class to make up the difference. Since understandably no one wants their taxes raised, in order to reduce spending they look to the “everything else” part of the discretionary budget. And NASA is part of this and is considered expendable. It’s sad to see such an important institution for the U.S. slowly dying. I want to believe the outlook is promising, but I just can’t see the future looking any brighter.