Hi Everyone,
I hope this finds everyone well.
With publication of this edition of the newsletter, we reach the milestone 15 years of publication.
The original purpose of the newsletter was to keep everyone updated as to Alert’s activities, NWS news and concerns and to be a form of “friendly spam” reminding everyone that “ALERT is still here, alive and well.”
Though on occasions the content has sometimes been as scattered as the scatterbrained editor, it has kept true to its purpose.
This isn’t “Mark’s Newsletter”, by the way. It’s YOUR newsletter.
Your input, advice, and most certainly your articles are welcome and needed, as sometimes the wellspring of inspiration and creativity runs perilously dry.
As long as it is non-political, won’t get us or me sued, and is in keeping with the spirit and purpose of the newsletter, anything is welcome.
I look forward to your newsletter contributions.
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2021 Atlantic Hurricane Season Begins
The Atlantic Hurricane Season officially begins June 1. The National Hurricane Center, to err on the side of caution in case there was an early arriving storm, which indeed happened with Subtropical Storm Ana, began issuing outlooks on May 15.
NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center is predicting an above-normal Atlantic hurricane season this year. NOAA predicts a likely range of 13 to 20 named storms, of which 6 to 10 could become hurricanes, including 3 to 5 major hurricanes. NOAA provides these ranges with a 70% confidence. An average hurricane season produces 12 named storms, of which 6 become hurricanes, including 3 major hurricanes.
As mentioned last month, both Colorado State University and Accuweather are also predicting above normal seasons.
This is due to warmer Atlantic Temperatures and the lack of El Nino conditions.
In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t really matter how many storms form, what matters is where they end up arriving. A year with 28 storms that never reach land isn’t overly significant, where a year with only one named storm and it being a repeat of Katrina, Camille or Andrew is.
With the 2021 North Atlantic Hurricane Season beginning it is a good time to review our preparedness plans.
This has become an annual tradition, this is the only Newsletter rerun that you ever see, and it grows a little longer year by year.
The source for much of this information is the late John Hope of the National Hurricane Center and later The Weather Channel.
While at the NHC, Hope developed a theory called the John Hope Rule. It consists of two parts. Part 1 states: “If a system is not a bona fide tropical storm before crossing the Windward Islands, or the Lesser Antilles, it will not survive the trek across the Eastern Caribbean Sea. If the wave is still present, formation in the Western Caribbean is possible.” Part 2 states: “If the structure of a wave or storm is good, never discount it or write it off”.
I call that “The Oops Rule” for when something shouldn’t have developed, but it does it anyway.
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Hurricane Impact & Hurricane Response
Alabama is impacted by hurricanes in three ways:
1. Direct Impact – Where the core of the storm or the rain / wind field strikes or passes through a portion of Alabama. Examples being Hurricane’s Fredrick, Opal, Ivan, and Katrina.
2. Indirect Impact – where the core is not over Alabama, but the feeder bands are passing through and causing havoc. Rita’s feeder bands being a good example, which dropped 21
tornadoes over west Alabama in a 4-hour period.
3. Distant Impact – A storm that is not even near Alabama but affecting our weather. Such as with Olivia, a Pacific Hurricane which was off Western Mexico. Her moisture was captured by the jet stream, crossed the Sonora desert, the Arklatex region & dumped monsoon type rains on Alabama & Mississippi, causing flooding.
ALERT typically will activate during scenarios 1 & 2. ALERT’s coverage would concentrate on monitoring D-Star directly and using a liaison station to monitor HF offsite on 3.965 MHz or the backup 40-meter frequency of 7.243 MHz
Then as the storm moves northward into the BMX County Warning Area the focus would then shift to the individual county Skywarn Nets, as we would do during a “normal” callout.
HF Gulf Coast Nets to monitor are:
Primary State ARES Frequencies & Nets for Gulf of Mexico & regular meeting times.
3.965 MHz Alabama Emergency Net Mike 4:00 PM Sunday*
3.940 MHz Florida Amateur Single Sideband Net 6:00 PM
3.975 MHz Georgia Single Sideband Net 7:30 PM
3.910 MHz Louisiana Traffic Net 6:30 PM
3.862 MHz Mississippi Section Phone Net 6:00 PM
3.873 MHz Texas Traffic Net 6:30 PM
* Note that this is also the frequency of the Alabama Traffic Net Mike, meeting daily at 5:30PM Central Time & Sunday’s at 8:00 AM Central Time and the Alabama Day Net, which meets daily at 10:00 AM Central Time.
Wide Coverage Nets
14.235 MHz Hurricane Watch Net As Needed
3.935 MHz Central Gulf Coast Hurricane Net 1:00 UTC
The Hurricane Watch Net is only activated when a storm is within 300 miles of a populated land mass. Normally you shouldn’t check into this net, but only listen. Only check in if you have a legitimate need to do so. A legitimate need being emergency or priority traffic or if the NCS specifically calls for a station in Central Alabama, only then should you pick the microphone up. Occasionally, if there is a lull in activity, they may give a call for general check-ins. But don’t be surprised if they don’t. Helping stations in the affected area is their primary concern.
Once upon a time a, which if I remember correctly was in 1988 when Gilbert, was rearranging Jamaica, the NCS asked “do we have any stations in the affected area, the affected area only?” Some fellow from Zero-land, piped in and very slowly drawled out “This is Kay Zero Que Arr Emmm, Homer over in Tulsa Oklahoma, just wanting to tell you fellers what a fine job, a fine job you fellers are doing. And, if I can be of any help, any help at all just let me know. This is Homer, K0QRM, over in Tulsa Oklahoma on frequency and standing by on the side.”
What harm was done? You might ask.
First, it hampers any emergency traffic trying to reach the net.
Fifteen distress calls probably could have been received and handled in the time it took Homer to ooze over “on the side”.
Secondly, it exacerbates the problem of NCS operator fatigue. Sometimes the adrenalin rush of the moment will keep an NCS sharp and “in the game” as it did with Ivan when I was on the air at K4NWS for 16 hours straight, but, minus that adrenalin rush, when it’s just station after station, checking in hour after hour, just so they can say they checked in, it can wear an NCS out.
So, learn from a bad example. Don’t do this.
Some Internet resources you should have in your toolbox include:
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/ – The National Hurricane Center out of Coral Gables, FL
http://www.hwn.org/tools/streaming-audio.html – Hurricane Watch Net Streaming Audio.
Note that the audio feed is only active when the net is active.
http://derecho.math.uwm.edu/models/ & http://www.ral.ucar.edu/hurricanes/realtime/current/
– Hurricane Forecast Models
http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/TC.html – Satellite imagery and data – worldwide
https://www.hurricanezone.net/ – Storm centered satellite imagery
Many other resources, including coastal radar picket, Caribbean & Mexican radar,
charts and satellite imagery can be found on my website, which is slowly being updated, www.freewebs.com/weatherlynx/ and clicking on “Tropics, Charts & Satellites”.
For the most reliable information, the National Hurricane Service and the local National Weather Service Forecast Offices for your area and the areas affected should always be your prime source.
The local offices know the historical conditions, topographical factors and the local quirks which make up the microclimate of the area, which may influence or alter situations on a local level, which a forecaster 500 miles away, no matter how good they may be, might not have a clue about.
Major media sources can be trusted, however, internet sources, especially social media prophets and gurus should never be substituted for official sources.
Social media reports and websites, until one knows their sources, the timeliness of their information, their track record of veracity and in some cases their motives, should, for one’s own safety, be viewed with a jaundiced eye and treated with the same caution as you should with all internet sources.
Don’t spread information without it being verified from authentic sources. Your credibility and very possibly the safety of others is at stake.
That includes my wise prognostications also.
Just remember that some who would have you believe their “expert opinions” are also the same ones who would have you believe that Queen Elizabeth is a shape shifting lizard lady. And, though I have always suspected that my second-grade teacher, “Mrs. Martin” aka “Madre De Satanás”, might have actually been one, in the case of the Queen, it is still yet unproven.
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Hurricane Tracking Gleams And Glints From Mark’s Crystal Ball
I’ve always enjoyed trying to second-guess the National Hurricane Center. It’s fun! Many times our forecasts agree, they have outguessed me an honorable number of times & every now and then, when Divine Providence intervenes, I have beaten them.
The following are some random hints and items I have stored in my dusty brain, which every now and then come into play as I gaze into my tropical crystal ball.
The first thing I will touch on is the name itself – “Hurricane” and its origin.
Some believe the name originated from “huracan” which was the Carib peoples of Northern South America term for “evil wind”. Others credit the Mayans of Central America and believe that is originates from “Hurakan”, the Mayan god of wind, storm and fire. According to the Mayan Creation Myth, Hurakan caused the Great Flood after the first humans angered the gods. According to the myth, he lived in the windy mists above the floodwaters and repeatedly called forth the earth until land came up from beneath the seas.
Whichever its origin, it is known that the names Hurican and Hurikan predate the appearance of Europeans on the horizons of what would become known as the “Americas”, stretching back into the dim mists of antiquity.
The Spanish word for “Hurricane” is “Huracan” to this day.
A couple of terms which you have undoubtedly heard of is “El Niño” & “La Niña”.
El Niño or more precisely the “El Niño Southern Oscillation” (ENSO), is a planetary-scale climate variation caused by interactions between the atmosphere and the Central and Eastern Pacific Ocean, which in turn affects the tropical climatology of the Gulf of Mexico and the North Atlantic Ocean.
El Niño refers to unusually warm ocean temperatures that occur every 2–7 years around Christmas time along Peruvian coast, extending into equatorial eastern and central Pacific Ocean, while La Niña refers to unusual cooler temperatures. A normal temperature is referred to as “neutral”.
Though many factors are used in making seasonal hurricane forecasts, El Niño & La Niña weigh heavily in the process.
The warm El Niño favors stronger hurricane activity in the central and eastern Pacific basins due to lower vertical wind shear, weaker trade winds and greater instability, while suppressing it in the Atlantic basin due to stronger wind shear tearing and shredding the thunderstorm columns of storms trying to form, stronger trade winds hampering large scale organization and greater atmospheric stability.
The cool La Niña does the opposite suppressing hurricane activity in the central and eastern Pacific basins and enhancing activity in the Atlantic basin.
2021 is La Niña year, which is one of the reasons why 2021 is expected that we will have a vigorous tropical season.
Some other hurricane facts are:
The maximum number of tropical systems that the Atlantic Basin (which includes the Gulf and Caribbean) can simultaneously contain, and support is five storms.
If major tropical systems get too close to one another they don’t merge as thunderstorms often do. The upper-level winds associated with each storm counteract or buffets each other preventing this from occurring.
If you have a large storm and a smaller storm enters the influence or wind field of the larger storm, the smaller storm will tend to rotate counterclockwise around the primary storm in a process called the Fujiwhara Effect.
If the smaller storm is very weak, say a tropical storm versus a Category 4 storm, it is possible that the smaller storms circulation can be totally disrupted by the larger storm and then it can be absorbed into the larger storm’s circulation. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNjUSsqJgek&feature=relmfu as Typhoon Ma-On gobbles up Tropical Storm Tokage in 2011.
Tropical systems, for all of their tremendous energy, are totally without an engine or steering mechanism, but are at the mercy of the whims of the upper-level winds. A tropical system can spin all it wants to, but unless the storms thunderstorm columns reach high enough to snag the upper-level winds, and then act as a sail, the storm is going nowhere fast. If the upper-level winds die down, the storm can drift aimlessly for days.
If the storm sits still long enough, it will begin to dissipate due to it stirring up the deeper cooler waters beneath it and it cooling the sea surface temperature below the 80 degree critical threshold needed to sustain a tropical storm. This is “upwelling”. The one exception to this rule is if it is sitting over the Gulf Stream, as the incoming current will continually replenish the warm water beneath the storm.
A well-formed storm will have a perfectly circular Central Dense Overcast or CDO, an area of thunderstorms surrounding the eye wall, with “feeder bands” of thunderstorms spiraling inward counterclockwise, parallel to the storm’s inbound horizontal winds, and “feeding” energy from the warm tropical ocean into the storm.
The winds being drawn into the eye, once arriving can only go in one direction – up – and in a well formed storm the system will be capped by high pressure, which helps evacuate these winds as they reach the stratosphere. This forms a false cirrus shield of clouds rotating in a clockwise fashion, as the winds are vented outward. If the storm has a tear drop shape or a long plume of clouds extending from the storm, this indicates heavy shearing, which will limit its growth, or shred the circulation. The storm will be veered by the shearing and try to deflect towards the direction of the plume.
A poorly organized storm can have a completely exposed center, with the cloud shield nowhere near the center. Until it starts “stacking up” it will remain a weak storm.
Intense, Category 3 or greater hurricanes will go through a process called an “eyewall replacement cycle”. In this case the eyewall contracts so small that some of the outer rain bands may strengthen and form an outer eyewall, causing the storm to weaken by robbing energy from the inner eyewall and will eventually choke it out completely and replace it, causing the storm to re-intensify.
This is a common occurrence. Less common is when you have a triple eyewall, as was the case with Typhoon June and Hurricane Juliette.
The fastest intensification from a Tropical Storm to a Category 5 Hurricane occurred with Hurricane Wilma in 2006, which in 24 hours went from 70 mph to 155 mph and then vacationed in the Yucatan.
The fastest intensification from a Tropical Depression to a Category 5 Hurricane occurred with Wilma & Hurricane Felix, which took just 54 hours to bloom and then blessed Nicaragua with its presence in 2007.
Honorable mention also goes to Hurricane Delta, which took just took just 36 hours to grow from a Tropical Depression to a Category 4 storm in October 2020.
The World Champion is Super Typhoon Hagibus which grew from a tropical storm to the equivalent of a Category 5 storm in only 18 hours in 2019.
Tropical systems cannot penetrate frontal boundaries. If a tropical system is threatening the coast, and you see that a front will be approaching the coast from the West, don’t worry about the coast, as it will either stall the storm, deflect it to the Northeast or as in the case of 2009’s Tropical Storm Danny, it can absorb a weak storm.
When looking at hurricane forecast model ensembles, such as http://derecho.math.uwm.edu/models/ & http://www.ral.ucar.edu/hurricanes/realtime/current/,
you can judge the “confidence” of the models by the grouping of the plotted tracks. If the plots are tightly grouped together, you can have “high confidence” in the reliability of the track and if the timing given by the plots agree, that also. The narrower the spread, the greater the confidence, and the wider the spread, the lesser the confidence. Some tracks will be obviously wrong, those you can dismiss. If the forecast tracks go look like they were written by a drunken spider, with paths going in every direction at once, that storm is heading nowhere fast.
One must be very cautious of jumping to conclusions when they see a forecast model indicating a tropical system and then blasting on the internet that “it’s about to get real in Mobile” and then causing people to panic and spread even more rumors online, when in fact that one model shows nothing 12 hours later. A single model can be misleading or just plain wrong. Consistency is the key. If a model consistently and persistently shows a system, then you know that THAT model thinks something will happen. But what do the other models say? Do they agree with the intensity and forecast track? Do they even show anything at all? That’s why the NHC is the best place to get your information.
The NHC issues outlooks for 2 days and 5 days. Beyond that everything is guesswork.
If a storm exists, they will issue full advisories every 12 hours and intermediate advisories every 6 hours.
One staple of NHC graphics is the “forecast cone” or “cone of uncertainty”, which represents the probable track of the center of the tropical cyclone.
The size of the cone is drawn so that about two-thirds of the time, the center of the storm will remain in the cone.
The cone does not take the size or shape of the storm into account, only where they think the center will be located. Some storms are large with damaging winds extending far beyond the cone. Some storms are compact, and the damaging winds lie within a small area in the cone. Some storms are lopsided, with nothing much happening on the western side leading people to carp about “over hyped forecasts for ratings” while the same distance away on the eastern side of the storm people are literally hanging on for dear life.
It is always to be remembered that a hurricane is not a point on a map; impacts often occur well outside of the core.
The cone indicates the forecast up to five days out from the last recorded position of the storm, with each increase in time from this initial period, the error factor grows.
Forecast Period (hours) Average NHC Forecast Track Error (miles)
12 9.1
24 26.3
36 42.0
48 56.9
72 73.8
96 109.7
120 221.7
This is why one should always get the latest information from the NHC, as they are constantly fine tuning their forecasts.
Tropical storms and hurricanes are steered by winds aloft, and the overall track can be a function of a storm’s intensity. These days, intensity forecasts still have some limitations, but there is a concerted effort to make improvements.
Theoretically Tropical Storms will lose strength over land. The 1997 version of Danny (which came up I-65 reached Birmingham and then turned East heading along I-20 towards Atlanta, as if He knew what he was doing) forgot this and strengthened while over the swamps of South Carolina and then moved into the Atlantic as a rejuvenated system heading for New England. The theory at that time was that the swamps were so warm and humid that the storm “thought” it was over the sea. Now they say it was due to the effects a frontal system closely following the storm. I always preferred the first explanation, as it seemed more logical, if not niftier.
Storms named “Danny” and I are old companions, incidentally. In 1985 I accidentally managed to intercept Hurricane Danny a few hours after it struck Louisiana. I remember the feeder bands passing with heavy rain and gusts, and then it calming and clearing in between waves. “Looks like it can’t decide whether it’s coming or going” said the old guy at a truck stop where I was refueling. I also remember making a ham sandwich for an old dog at a rest stop. Old Shep looked hungry, so I fixed him one. He woofed it down, thanked me kindly and then disappeared into the mist.
What is the “D” storm for 2021? Danny, of course.
If a storm strikes just West of Alabama, expect sorry weather. If it strikes just East of Alabama, expect dry weather and lowering humidity, as the storm drags the moisture away with it.
If a 120 MPH storm is moving North at 20 MPH the wind field around the eye will be affected as follows. The winds on the Eastern side combine and are in effect 140 MPH, while the winds to the West subtract and are in effect 100 MPH. This is the “fast moving hurricane rule”.
If the Eastern Pacific Basin is active, the Atlantic Basin will be quiet & if the Atlantic Basin is active the Eastern Pacific Basin will be quiet.
Category 5 storms have never occurred in both the Atlantic & Pacific Basins in the same year.
Hurricanes can cross Central America from either the Atlantic or Pacific Basins, enter the other Basin and restrengthen and be renamed. The last being in 1996 when Category 1 Hurricane Cesar which scraped Northern South America, crossed Central America & restrengthened into Category 4 Hurricane Douglas.
Then there is the case of 1961’s Hurricane Hattie, which formed in the Caribbean, stuck Central America on Halloween, dissipated, then after reaching the Pacific, her remnants helped generate Tropical Storm Simone on November 1. Simone then turned Northwest striking Southern Mexico on November 2, dissipated and her remnants crossed Mexico, entering the Gulf of Mexico. These remnants in turn helped generate Tropical Storm Inga, which dissipated on November 8.
Alphabetical name position can’t be used as an indicator of possible storm strength. Andrew and Opal, both unruly guests, with names toward the opposite ends of the alphabet, are good examples.
Never underestimate the potential impacts of late season storms. Category 5 Hurricane Mitch was active from October 22 – November 5, 1998, with maximum sustained winds of 180 MPH. This storm struck Central America, Yucatán Peninsula & South Florida causing 6.2 billion dollars in damage and caused 11,000 deaths.
Remember that winds do not blow OUT of a hurricane; they are drawn INTO the storm in a spiraling motion. By factoring in the Coriolis Effect of the Earth’s rotation and the counter-effects of surface friction you can determine the general direction of any tropical storm or non-tropical low-pressure center using the surface wind direction as follows:
Wind Direction Storm Center Location
South North West
Southeast West
East Southwest
Northeast South
North Southeast
Northwest East
West Northeast
Southwest North
Calm winds suddenly occurring during a hurricane indicates the eye is over you. The winds will return just as suddenly, often stronger in the opposite direction.
My sister’s family was living at Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines in 1974, when Typhoon Bidang passed directly over. When the winds suddenly died down, they knew they were in the eye. Suddenly there was a knock on the door and opening it she found a delivery van with the furniture she had ordered. The Filipinos crew unloaded everything, said “thank you” and drove off into the darkness as the rear of the eyewall appeared and began blowing at full force.
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NHC Hurricane Tracking Chart PDF’s
Here are handy hurricane tracking charts from the National Hurricane Center.
For the Atlantic Ocean: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/tracking_chart_atlantic.pdf
For the Pacific Ocean: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/tracking_chart_epacific.pdf
Someone once asked me “why do you bother tracking the Pacific ones?” For practice, so that when the Atlantic ones do appear you are already ahead of the game experience wise.
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Mark’s Almanac
Originally the fourth Roman Month, June at one time had 29 days, until Julius Caesar in a glow of inspiration added the 30th day.
What June was named for is uncertain. Some say it was named for Juno, wife & sister of Jupiter. Juno was the goddess of marriage and a married couple’s household, so some consider it good luck to be married in this month, which is why June has become a month for so many marriages.
The beginning of meteorological Summer is June 1.
Storm activity retains many of the characteristics of spring, but more and more the pattern takes on the summer pattern of pop-up thunderstorms.
Hurricane season begins, June 1, however June hurricanes are usually small and of minor intensity, occurring roughly once every two years.
The centers for June Tropical Cyclone activity are the extreme Western Caribbean, with the storm tracks striking the Yucatan or veering toward Western Florida & the Southwestern Gulf of Mexico, with other storm tracks aiming toward the Mexican mainland.
From 1851 to 2020 there have been 95 Tropical Storms and 33 Hurricanes, of which 19 impacted the United States. The most notable June hurricane was Audrey, one of the deadliest tropical cyclones in US history, which killed 416 as it devastated the southwestern Louisiana coast in 1957.
The center of maximum tornadic activity shifts northward over Kansas and Iowa. Activity in Texas and Oklahoma dies down. There is a 5% decrease in tornadic activity over the May average & by June 4th 50% of the year’s tornadoes have occurred.
Days continue to grow longer as the Sun’s angle above the noonday horizon increases from 78.5 degrees at the beginning of the month to maximum of 79.9 on Summer Solstice on June 21 and then lowering to 79.6 degrees at the month’s end. Daylight increases from 14 hours 14 minutes on June 1 to the maximum daylight of 14 hours 23 minutes at Summer Solstice on June 21 and then decreases to 14 hours 21 minutes on June 30.
Sunrise and sunset times for Birmingham are:
June 1 Sunrise 5:38 AM Sunset 7:52 PM
June 15 Sunrise 5:37 AM Sunset 7:59 PM
June 30 Sunrise 5:40 AM Sunset 8:01 PM
Looking skyward, the Sun, magnitude -26.7 is in Taurus.
At the beginning of the month Mercury, magnitude 1.2 in Taurus slips below the western horizon.
On June 10 Mercury will pass between the Earth and the Sun or will be at “Inferior Conjunction”.
Venus, magnitude -3.9 on the Gemini-Taurus border, is low in the Northwest in the afterglow of sunset. Venus should be easy to spot if the sky there is clear.
Venus’s 225 day orbit around the Sun will carry it to its closest point to the Sun, “Perihelion” on June 12.
Earth, magnitude -4.0, as viewed from the Sun, is in the constellation Taurus.
Mars, magnitude 1.7, approaching the feet of Gemini The Twins glows in the west right after dark.
Dwarf Planet Ceres, magnitude 9.2, is in Cetus The Sea Serpent.
Jupiter, magnitude –2.4, in Aquarius and Saturn, magnitude +0.6, in Capricorn, shine in the southeast before the first light of dawn, are still fairly close to each other, but are slowly spreading apart.
Saturn rises around midnight and Jupiter follows Saturn into the sky about 30 to 45 minutes later.
Uranus is out of sight in the glow of dawn.
Neptune, 7.8 magnitude, Aquarius, 22° east of Jupiter, lurks low in the east-southeast before dawn begins.
Dwarf Planet Pluto, with his five moons shines at a dim 14.4 in Sagittarius.
Dwarf Planet 136108 Haumea, its ring, and moons Hiʻiaka and Namaka, shines at a faint magnitude of 17.4 in Bootes.
Dwarf Planet 136472 Makemake with his moon faintly shines at magnitude 17.2 in Coma Berenices.
Dwarf Planet 136199 Eris and her moon Dysnomia is barely visible in the most powerful telescopes at magnitude 18.8 in Cetus the Sea Monster
Last Quarter Moon, or when the moon has only the Eastern side illuminated, will occur June 1.
The Moon will be at Apogee, or her farthest point from the Earth on June 7 at 252,420 Miles.
New Moon will occur June 10 at 5:54 AM CDT or 10:54 UTC. This is the best time of the month to observe faint objects such as galaxies and star clusters because there is no moonlight to interfere.
There will be an Annular Solar Eclipse on June 10. An annular solar eclipse occurs when the Moon is too far away from the Earth to completely cover the Sun. This results in a ring of light around the darkened Moon. The Sun’s corona is not visible during an annular eclipse. The path of this eclipse will be confined to extreme eastern Russia, the Arctic Ocean, western Greenland, and Canada. A partial eclipse will be visible in the northeastern United States, Europe, and most of Russia.
First Quarter Moon, or when the moon has only the Western side illuminated, will occur June 17.
Summer Solstice will occur at 10:21 PM CDT June 20 or 03:21 UTC on June 21. The North Pole of the earth will be tilted toward the Sun, which will have reached its northernmost position in the sky and will be directly over the Tropic of Cancer at 23.44 degrees north latitude. This is the first day of summer in the Northern Hemisphere and the first day of winter in the Southern Hemisphere.
The Moon will be at Perigee, or her closest point from the Earth on June 23 at 223,669 Miles.
June’s Full Moon is “Strawberry Moon” in Native American folklore. This will occur on June 24 at 1:40 PM CDT or 18:40 UTC. The Moon will be located on the opposite side of the Earth as the Sun and its face will be fully illuminated. It is called “Strawberry Moon” for it signals the time to start harvesting strawberries, as it is peak strawberry ripening time. Other names are “Rose Moon” & “Honey Moon”.
This is also the last of three supermoons for 2021. The Moon will be near its closest approach to the Earth and may look slightly larger and brighter than usual.
The June Bootids Meteor Shower will occur from June 26th until July 2nd. It peaks on June 27th. Normally the shower is very weak, with a Zenith Hourly Rate or ZHR of 1 or 2, but occasional outbursts produce a hundred or more meteors per hour. The source of the June Bootids is Comet 7P/Pons-Winnecke, which orbits the Sun once every 6.37 years.
Unfortunately, a near Full Moon will wash out all but the brightest meteors.
On January 3, 2021 G J Leonard of the Mount Lemmon Observatory discovered an inbound comet which at that time was at the same distance from the Sun as Jupiter. This comet, C/2021 A1 (Leonard), though faint now, if it matches its brightness forecast, which so far it has, at its peak in December, it should be easily visible using binoculars and perhaps a naked eye object.
Stay tuned fore for more.
4389 planets beyond our solar system have now been confirmed as of May 17, per NASA’s
Exoplanet Archive http://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/
In 2013 the European Space Agency – ESA launched the Gaia Space Observatory. It is
designed for astrometry: the measuring of positions, distances, and motions of stars. The mission’s goal is to construct the largest and most precise 3D space catalog ever made, with over
1 billion astronomical objects, mainly stars, but also planets, comets, asteroids, and quasars, among others, monitoring each of its target objects about 70 times to study the precise position and motion of each target, and will keep doing so as the mission continues.
The ESA has released the most detailed map of the Milky Way ever produced, containing 1.7 billion stars. This map views the Milky Way edge on, since that how it its draped across the night sky, because of our location in the galaxy we are looking from the inside out. The image is the complete night sky from the center of the galaxy in Sagittarius to the opposite point or anticenter in the constellation Auriga, and Beta Tauri (Elnath), the bright star that appears nearest this point.
ESA_Gaia_DR2_AllSky_Brightness_Colour_8000x4000_transparent.png (8000×4000)
Looking at seven million stars they found that some 30 000 of them were part of an ‘odd collection’ moving through the Milky Way. The observed stars are currently passing by our solar neighborhood and we are so deeply embedded in this collection that its stars surround us almost completely, and so can be seen across most of the night sky.
Even though they are interspersed with other stars, the stars in the collection stood out in the Gaia data because they all move along elongated trajectories in the opposite direction to the majority of the Galaxy’s other hundred billion stars, including the Sun.
These stars, since they are draped in an elongated fashion through the galaxy have been nicknamed the “Gaia Sausage”.
It is believed that these stars are the remnants of another galaxy that collided with and then merged into the Milky Way early in its life, around 10 billion years ago
The stars now form most of our Galaxy’s inner halo – a diffuse component of old stars that were born at early times and now surround the main bulk of the Milky Way known as the central bulge and disc.
Globular Star Cluster NGC 2808 in the constellation Carina, one of our galaxy’s most massive clusters, containing more than a million stars is considered by some as the remnant core of that galaxy and is estimated to be 12.5-billion years old.
There is another collision scheduled, by the way.
The Milky Way and M31, the Andromeda Galaxy, orbit around a common center of gravity called the “barycenter” and are closing in on each other at 68 miles per second and will eventually collide with or merge with each other, disrupting both galaxies spiral structures and then settling into a stable shape.
The Milky Way and Andromeda won’t meet for another 4 to 5 billion years and won’t truly merge for another 5 or so billion years after that and though It will be a dramatic transformation, only on the largest of scales will the merger look like anything like a collision. The stars in each galaxy are spaced too far apart to have a good chance of them hitting each other.
They won’t be alone, either. Studies suggest that M33, the Triangulum Galaxy, the third-largest galaxy of the galaxy cluster which we belong to, The Local Group, will participate in the collision event, also. Its most likely fate is to end up orbiting the merged remnant of the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies and finally to merge with it in an even more distant future.
Luckily my homeowner’s insurance covers all of this, which as the Attorney Mike Slocum says on TV it is “just another frog on a lily pad in a lake of pain.”
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This month’s meeting will be on June 8. The meeting will be done remotely as was last month’s meeting.
Details and instructions will be issued as the time nears.
Hope to “see” you there!
Mark / WD4NYL
Editor
ALERT Newsletter
Wd4nyl@bellsouth.net
Mark’s Weatherlynx
Weather Resource Database
www.freewebs.com/weatherlynx/
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