Media weather forecasts

[bluemingidiot]

If you are not a weather nerd like me, go away--this is not for you.



When I was young, media weather people distinguished between drizzle and rain.  If only drizzle was likely, they made light of it and went on to other things.  Nowadays, the newer and dumber generations of weather casters spend a week hyping the possibilities, including the insignificant accumulations, of drizzle.  It is the centerpiece of their forecast.  But to create more excitement and anticipation from viewers, they call drizzle, rain.



Now according to dictionaries, drizzle and rain are both water drops.  But what do word nerds know about weather?  Likely they spend as little time as possible experiencing weather and when they do get in it, probably find it regrettable.



Scientifically, rain drops have a diameter of 0.02 inch or greater and fall from cumulus clouds.  Rain drops can get up to about 0.16 inch diameter, any larger and most likely they will divide.  Drizzle has a diameter of less than 0.02 inch and usually comes from stratus clouds.  The likelihood of the particular cloud cover producing the moisture is certainly predictable.  Weather persons today well may not know the differences between cumulus and stratus clouds.  If they have any interest in learning about weather, they are devoid of any interest in teaching their viewers about weather.  They connect with their viewers in that their major interest is what to wear on a particular day.
  They are much more focused on being media celebrities than being meteorologists.


Yes, drizzle has a paramount importance in freezing weather, but where I live, we don't have that much freezing weather.  The paramount importance of moisture in this area is, 'Will there be enough of it to keep flora and fauna alive and well?'  To call drizzle and what falls from thunderstorms both rain is like calling both a breeze and a hurricane, wind.

[here to stay]

Rain- its variations and permutations- are a special interest here. It varies from heavy mist, where you can't feel any rain drops but you get soaking wet fast, to rain so heavy that it's a solid sheet.

The rain that will really do damage is the steady rain of any type that has hours and hours without breaks. It falls in the hills and mountains, not necessary seeming threatening, then slow wends its ways down. As time passes, the ground has absorbed as much as it can and all subsequent rain rushes over the surface, where ordinary drainage can not keep up with it. Creeks and rivers flood and life becomes much more difficult.

Right now our area is playing catch up with rain soaked landslides after our years of drought. There are landsides over roads that are just about fixed, then get closed again. At least one major highway is clised and months will pass before it can be reopened. And landslides where the road itself slides into a river or the ocean and repairs are unlikely to happen in years, if ever.

Rain, whether it is too much or too little, is critically important.

[bluemingidiot]

If it is too little, it is critically insufficient here.

[Use Less]

I read somewhere that impending bad weather is one thing that brings or holds viewers to TV news programs. It is a business decision to hype the weather, since fewer and fewer people watch news or read papers.