Snowstorm is a sure sign of – global warming?
December 27th, 2010 at 1:07 pm by Ted Nesi under General Talk
The Boxing Day Blizzard is pretty much over, and people are continuing to clean up from the storm – check out my afternoon WPRI.com story for more information and head to our home page for lots of other details.
The New York Times op-ed page had a slightly contrarian take on the weather over the weekend. Judah Cohen, who heads up an environmental research firm in Massachusetts, says the wintry conditions are actually a sign of global warming:
That is why the Eastern United States, Northern Europe and East Asia have experienced extraordinarily snowy and cold winters since the turn of this century. Most forecasts have failed to predict these colder winters, however, because the primary drivers in their models are the oceans, which have been warming even as winters have grown chillier. They have ignored the snow in Siberia.
I was actually thinking a little about this myself yesterday, remembering my days as an environmental reporter. It also shows why it’s probably more accurate to call the phenomenon in question “climate change” instead of “global warming.”
Tags: boxing day blizzard, climate change, snowstorm, Weather
Nesi's Notes covers politics and the economy in and around Rhode Island for WPRI.com. (Twitter: 
Seems the intensity of the storm is a sure sign of climate change. There were reports of gusts up to 92mph on Block Island and numerous hurricane force gusts on the outer Cape. We’ve had strong nor’easters for generations, but that is crazy strong.
I hadn’t heard 92mph on Block Island, although I can believe it considering the Weather Service’s list got 80mph in Wellfleet and 79mph in Orleans.
My colleague Michelle Muscatello, one of our meteorologists, was saying to me this morning that she was struck by just how intense this storm was when looking at barometric pressure levels, which dropped very low at its height.
I also like that when Michelle visits elementary schools, she tells them to remember how barometric pressure relates to storms by remembering that “high pressure” is “happy weather” (good weather) and “low pressure” is “lousy weather.” I might go for the whole lesson next time she’s in one of those classrooms.
Check out the satellite images at the top of this Washington Post article: link
That looks like a hurricane.