Weather Appreciation

[GordonH]

Not sure if this right spot, Oh well. Talk about having to do a little dusting around house. Wow

Not to mention the swimming pool.

[Glacier]

That's some good weather appreciation, Hockeyfan.

It's hard not to appreciate the weather when we see how much precipitation the Peace Region has received over the past few weeks. In just two storms since the middle of June, the breadbasket of BC has received 10 INCHES of rain! Yes, that's inches, or 250 mm if you will. By comparison, Penticton has received 10 mm and Vernon (typically marginally wetter than the Peace) has had 21 mm over this same timespan.

More interesting info:

- Chetwynd was the wettest place in BC last month (188.9 mm) - wetter than Boat Bluff, where they (I use the word they loosely since this place is merely a lightstation outpost) average in excess of 5 meters of precipitation annually.

- Since the 14th of June, Chetwynd, Fort St. John, and Dawson Creek have had 79%, 74%, and 65% of their average annual rainfall, or about 50% of their annual precipitation.

- By comparison, the Okanagan has only had about 4% of it's annual precipitation over this time frame.

Here are a few highway 97 pictures:

[Lady tehMa]

That is some impressive camera work! Old Mom Nature sure seems pissy lately, menopause?

[Frisk]

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[Glacier]

Links? Try the weather winners webpage... http://climate.weatheroffice.gc.ca/winners/intro_e.html
and the climate normals page... http://www.climate.weatheroffice.gc.ca/ ... dex_e.html

An interesting observation about the Weather Winners site:

For many of these cities, the airport is the reference point (Vernon is one exception), and while most airports are fairly indicative of their city's weather, this is not the case for Williams Lake because the airport is over 1000 feet higher than the city.

Weather records in the Williams Lake valley bottom show that the average daytime temperature in the summer is almost 4 degree warmer down there than the airport. If the airport were located in the valley bottom, Williams Lake would be 23rd (of 100) for the hottest summers in Canada instead of the 90th place the airport gives the city.

By comparison, Kelowna has the 4th hottest summers in Canada, but if the airport were to be moved up to Joe Rich Creek (3.27 degrees cooler than the valley bottom), Kelowna would only have the 58th hottest summers in Canada.

[Lady tehMa]

Hey Glacier, what can you tell me about comparative humidity? It feels moister this year, but I understand that feelings are subjective. Do you have an index somewhere that you can graph? is feeding the habit . . .

[Glacier]

You're absolutely right, LTM, it's been quite humid - July 12th of this year (at 10:00 pm to be exact) was the most humid recording in Kelowna since September 1st, 2009.

When discussing the absolute humidity of the air, relative humidity is a useless variable; therefore, the easiest way to describe the moisture content of the air with by the dew point temperature. The higher the value, the more humid the air. A dew point temperature of 16°C means that if the water in the air cools down to 16 degrees, equilibrium is reached between the gas and liquid phases. It is at this point that dew or frost forms.

H2O (l) <----> H2O (g)

Here is a quick comparison of various places around BC comparing maximum dew point temperature this week against last year's July max:

Location.............. 2010....... 2011
Vernon========= 14.9==== 17.1
Puntzi------------------- 10.9------- 12.5
Kelowna======== 14.6==== 16.0
Fort St John----------- 13.2------- 14.5
Kamloops-------------- 14.6------- 15.4
Williams Lake-------- 13.1------- 12.8
Penticton======== 14.6==== 14.2
Cranbrook-------------- 15.0------- 14.5

Further notes:

- The lower the dew point, the drier the air.
- Summer is typically the most humid season of the year.
- While the actual air temperature changes dramatically throughout the day, the dew point temperature does not.
- Whitehorse and Williams Lake have the least humid air of any city in Canada during the summer.

Sorry, not time for graphs today.

[Frisk]

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[Lady tehMa]

thx Glace, nice to know it isn't all in my head.

Here's a news story about lousy BC weather http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2011/07/14/bc-cool-summer.html#.TiBJZ4Hk0Go.facebook

@ Quailize - those are some neat pics! BTW, your name? Every time I see it I picture a person turning into a quail a la "The Fly" . . .

[Frisk]

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[Frisk]

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[Graphite]

Two rainbows this week!

[Lady tehMa]

we're back to rain again today but with a forecast high of 30 or so?

[Frisk]

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[Glacier]

A friend of mine was driving through Kamloops two days ago when a flash thunderstorm hit. Here is what he saw as one car attempted to drive under the railway tracks on 10th Ave.