charli's Blog

Okay, turned on FOX this AM... no rain predicted today, some possible tomorrow.  Got drenched at lunch time!  Got on the computer and no rain was shown for today.

Okay, we have rain and a cold front, the coldest one this season, predicted for the weekend.  Will it be colder than predicted... with snow?  Remember that last cold front, election week... we froze our tails off.  Predictions were for highs in the 70's... never made it.  FOX guys are still the best, but even they have been off too many times this past year... not as bad as the other stations, but....

look at this link... http://weather.myfoxtampabay.com/maps/WTVT/baron/anima
ted_h.html

It says Fay is moving to the NE on the blurb to the right of the radar.

I am a "weather geek".   I predicted that Fay would be named a TS early Friday afternoon while FOX was still saying that it would stay a depression and all spaghetti models showed it moving to the east of the state! 

Okay... I have a great record of predicting where storms go.  I am an amatuer meteorologist who predicted that Charlie would not hit Tampa the night before it made its turn east... while everyone else was saying that is was going to continue north to Tampa.   

Okay... all the models have Fay coming towards Florida... east, middle of the state, or west of us... but still affecting us.  We currently have a system over us that was supposed to have moved out yesterday but is now supposed to stay over us.  Won't that system affect Fay's path?  Make it turn more north (east of FL) or more west depending on the system over us?  That is what turned Charlie east when it did... a system moving in from the north.

Okay... I watched the weather on Thursday AM to see a few "blips" out in the Gulf and was told that the showers might make it to shore, but that the rain would be in the afternoon... "after 2PM" were the words used.  I got to work, blue skies all around... at 7AM.  Went on break at 9 and got hit with a few drops.  At 10 the skies to the west got dark.  Being the "unofficial" weather person for the department, and my coworker getting ready to leave and visit one of our sites, I pulled up the radar.... there was this gigantic round blob of rain over Pinellas and western Hillsborough...  a look out the window showed that it was raining!   I repeat, the early AM weather forecast said rain in the afternoon...  "after 2PM".  The radar image looked almost like a tropical storm.  Went to lunch at 11:30... it was raining.  Grant it, it was nice and cool, but I love doing my crossword puzzles at lunch.  Kinda hard to do while holding an umbrella.  Got back to my desk and saw the radar showing that the blob had elongated and was heading south. 

A few of us long time Tampa people got into a conversation... April meant the start of the "cocktail hour" 4PM t-storms... noticabley absent the past few years.  September was the early AM showers... also MIA the past few years. 

Yippee!!!! We are finally getting some rain... not the normal spring/summer schedules but...  Do not know which board to post this on... Weather? Traffic?  Maybe both.

There are certain rules for driving in the rain... obvious is to drive slower, avoid areas that flood, pull into a parking lot if the rain is coming down so hard that you can't see! 

Just because you drive a ATV/SUV does not mean that you can drive the way you do.  Just because you can drive through high water at a high rate speed does not mean that you should.  Think about others.  The other day I drove through an area that the streets were flooded.  I was new to the area and did not know that the road flooded.  I slowed down and rode in the midde of the road, as I was trained, pulling over when on cars came  toward me.  The drivers of the ATV/SUV's?  They sped down the road and the splashes blinded other drivers.

And... do not drive with your flashers on!  The flashers are meant to be used when you are at a stop... I got caught in one of Sunday's storms and was driving on Waters when I saw at least 2 drivers with their flashers on! 

My pic is an example of my question.  (If you turn your head to the left you can see a FL native walking up the coast.... The animated radar was really a blast to watch!)  The day I captured the radar image we had been told that there was no chance of rain.  It poured while I drove home from work!

On Saturday morning I woke up early, 6:30, to catch the weather.  The approaching front was depicted as a solid blue line going northeast of us... coming over us was the red and blue line... "The front will not effect us.  We will see some areas hit the upper 80's to low 90's on Sunday."  In the last weather segment of the morning the line had turned to the solid blue line with the front coming across us and "seasonable temps in the low 80's, low humidity, and morning temps in the 60's, and no rain".  I woke up to rain!

FL does not go by the "April showers bring May flowers" saying.  Yet we've had a wet April.  I love the lower temps... and the savings on my electric bill, but... what awaits us in the next few months.  All the new equipments is tauted as making future forcasts more accurate... but so far the foreasts have been off more often than on. 

Paul and I had this joke last fall about which one of us was causing the rain to miss where we lived, but downpours all over the rest of the county.  It would be pouring a few blocks all around us, but we didn't get a drop. 

I am afraid of what the upcoming hurricane season will be like.

pics were great but does anyone remember what today is... the 31st anniversary of the Tampa Blizzard!  I just moved so I can't find the pics I took... I will post them when I find them... but this city shut down!  In Brandon, our back yard looked like what I remembered as a child in Ohio... my 4 year old daughter cried, the dog went outside, stopped in his tracks, and walked backwards in his tracks after looking around at the strange view.  I have cleaned up the story that I usually tell people of the first site of snow that morning ;-)

If I remember correctly, it was the first time schools were closed for a "snow day".