Weather Geeks

Guest: Dr. Stephan Rasp, Senior Research Scientist at GoogleAs technology continues to improve, weather models are becoming increasingly more accurate in the short term due to increased computing power and increased resolution. But how can we quantify that increase in accuracy? It seems like a basic question, but one that isn’t so easy to answer....without the assistance of machine learning!. Joining us today is Stephan Rasp, to talk about WeatherBench, an open-source framework that aims to help answer the questions on weather model accuracy.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. C. Alex Young, NASA HeliophysicistYou may have noticed there’s been plenty of conversation concerning the closest star to us over the past year or so. From the total solar eclipse in April to the increase in solar storms as we approach the solar maximum, the sun has been getting plenty of attention. So we wanted to take a deeper look into our celestial neighbor and what better way to do that than to invite Dr. Alex Young, a heliophysicist, on the weather geeks podcast!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Craig Ramseyer, Assistant Prof. at Virginia TechWhen a drought is depicted on TV or in movies, you’ll usually see parched farmland with wilted crops and a distressed farmer in denim overalls looking over them. What about the drought that resides in the column of air above our heads, what does that look like? Well, there hasn’t been a TON of research on that aspect of drought…until now with my guest today! Craig Ramseyer is utilizing a newly proposed drought index to predict and measure flash droughts in the Caribbean, which aims to trigger policymakers to enact drought mitigation faster and more efficiently.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Jeff Berardelli, WFLA-TV Chief MeteorologistAs you go about your daily life, you may check your local news station for the weather for the day and for the rest of the week. How about a little sprinkling of the weather for the rest of the year? Or the rest of the decade? Our guest today has been incorporating hints of our changing climate in his local weather segments in hopes of getting his audience to be a little more conscious about the environment around them. Not too much to scare them, but just enough to make them stop and think! Let’s welcome Jeff Berardelli to the Weather Geeks podcast…!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Madison CondonAs much as you’d want to stop drinking out of plastic straws or hop on public transportation, there is only so much that one person can do to help save our environment and curb the effects of climate change. A lot of the responsibility comes down to our political and financial leaders. We have to hope that they have the right information provided to them to make critical decisions about our planet’s future, and if they don’t have that information, they may not be asking the right questions and thus getting the wrong answers. We have a special guest on Weather Geeks today to talk all about climate & environmental law, and that is professor Madison Condon from the Boston University School of Law.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. Kevin SimmonsEpisode Intro: In our current tornado and severe thunderstorm warning system, if you are put under a warning, there is no question that you should take action and protect yourself and your property. But what if the warning is posed with a probability of the storm making a severe impact? Would you be more or less influenced to take action? What about if you own a business and have to make decisions not just for yourself, but also your employees and customers. A lot of questions and we’ve got just the guy here on the show today to maybe give us some insight into the answers! Dr. Kevin Simmons, who is a professor of economics at Austin College, focuses on natural hazards and he is here with us on Weather Geeks today…See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Evan BentleyEpisode Intro: In the world of meteorology, the letters “SPC” carry a lot of weight. From severe weather to flooding and fire, the Storm Prediction Center covers almost everything under the sun! Today’s guest has spent the past several years on staff at the SPC as a mesoscale-assistant/fire weather forecaster. He has brought his years of forecasting to Norman, Oklahoma and today he joins us on Weather Geeks… Welcome to the show Evan Bentley….See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. David WilmouthEpisode Intro: On January 15, 2022, a massive eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano occurred, sending literal shockwaves around the globe and releasing millions of tons of material into the atmosphere. This eruption was unprecedented in the modern satellite era in terms of how much water vapor was injected into the stratosphere and just how far into the stratosphere it penetrated. Here to talk about the impacts of the eruption on the stratosphere is Dr. David Wilmouth.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Adam Smith, NOAA / NCEIEpisode Intro: 2023 set the record for the most billion dollar disasters in the United States in one calendar year. As the name suggests, a billion dollar disaster is a weather or climate disaster event with losses exceeding one billion dollars. From flooding to drought, winter storms to hurricanes, there were 28 billion dollar disasters last year. Our next guest is the lead scientist for the National Centers for Environmental Information Billion-dollar Weather and Climate Disasters analysis. Welcome to the show Adam Smith…See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. Jonathan Kahl, Professor at UW-MilwaukeeIf you’re a sports fan, you may know the term “Scorigami!” When you have a score combination that has never occurred before, you achieve Scorigami! And this inspired our guest Dr. Jonathan Kahl to create “Weathergami.” Instead of Team A vs Team B, he looks at high temperature vs low temperature at each location. While it sounds like a fun way to organize and visualize temperature data, it can have simple to digest benefits to discussing climate data across the country. Now, let’s geek out about Weathergami with the creator Dr. Jonathan Kahl…See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Greg CarbinOver the past half a century, we’ve been experiencing the same thunderstorms, blizzards, and hurricanes. Our changing climate may have altered how these weather phenomena act, and in turn the technology we use to research and forecast these events have changed as well! From a local NWS office to the SPC and the WPC, today’s guest has seen decades of change across these institutions and has made them all greater along the way. We’re talking to Greg Carbin, chief of forecast operations at the WPC, ahead of his well-deserved retirement today on Weather GeeksSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. Justin SharpeWe all know the saying “if a tree falls in a forest and there’s nobody around to hear it, does it make a sound?” Well in our world, we can say something like “if a forecast is perfect, but it doesn’t get disseminated properly, did it do any good?” There are still leaps and bounds that need to be made in the weather industry to bridge the gap between the research and communication when it comes to severe weather of all shapes and sizes. We have Dr. Justin Sharpe here on the show today to discuss the work being done in the social sciences both in the present and future…See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Liz LeitmanYou are probably familiar with severe thunderstorm and tornado watches. The storm prediction center and its predecessors have been issuing them since the 1950’s to alert people that thunderstorms may develop and bring damaging winds, hail or tornadoes. About a hundred of these are issued every year. Believe it or not, the first convective watch issued by a woman was just last year in 2023. The author of that severe thunderstorm watch was Liz Leitman - and she is here today on Weather Geeks!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. Michael MannThe topic of climate change and the future of our planet is both a controversial as well as at times difficult topic to understand. But if we want to know more about our future, we need to take a look into the history of our planet and our species. In his latest book, Our Fragile Moment, Dr. Michael Mann walks readers through our paleoclimate record and illustrates how it can serve as a roadmap to preserving our fragile moment. What you decide to do from there is entirely up to you.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Roundtable with: Jen Carfagno, Dr. Greg Postel, Heather ZonsAnother year around the sun means another year of all sorts of weather, both the beautiful and the horrible. Every single season brought its own flavor of extreme weather, from crippling winter storms to monstrous tornadoes to scalding wildfires and of course tropical storms and hurricanes. Even if these weather events didn’t physically impact you, their scope in the weather world was so large that you couldn’t ignore the conversation. And speaking of conversation, we’re going to close out the year on the Weather Geeks podcast and break down these most notable weather events of 2023!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Derek Manzello, Program CoordinatorPicture a coral reef, and you probably have visions of Flounder from The Little Mermaid or Crush from Finding Nemo. Coral reefs should be brimming with life, and are one of Earth’s most diverse ecosystems, providing significant ecological, economic and societal benefits. Unfortunately, they are threatened by climate change, pollution and more. Dr. Derek Manzello - an award winning coral reef ecologist - leads NOAA’s efforts in the Coral Reef Watch Program to understand and predict the trends in warming oceans and our fragile coral reefs.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Chris Goode, Climavision FounderIntroduction: You know the saying: if you put good in, you get good out! In the meteorology world, if you put good data in, you’ll get a good forecast out. But what about the areas that don’t have good data to put into the model, more specifically good radar data? Some areas just aren’t adequately covered and lie in what’s called a radar gap or a doppler dead zone. This makes researching and forecasting severe weather in these areas much more difficult. One way to alleviate this issue is to install more hi-res radars which is what a company called Climavision is doing. Joining us today is Chris Goode, the Founder & CEO, to talk about why it’s important to install these radars and what their company hopes to do with the information it collects.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Mayra Oyola-Merced, Assistant Professor at UW-MadisonIntroduction: Whether it is preparing for hurricane season or getting ready for a severe weather outbreak, you might hear the phrase “weather models.” All kinds of data go into these models, but a new input could be game changing for weather modeling as we head into the future. Satellites. Our next guest is currently an Assistant Professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where her research focuses on satellite and space-borne remote sensing, specifically in the areas of aerosol and cloud radiative effects, severe weather, air quality, and disaster/hazard risk reduction. Welcome Mayra Oyola-Merced to the show…See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. Andrew SchwartzFor several months of the year, the Central Sierra Snow Lab looks like a winter wonderland. Over 60 feet of snow fell this past winter at the lab and our next guest was there to experience it all. Dr. Andrew Schwartz, lead scientist and station manager of the University of California Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab, studies snowfall, snowpack, and the impact of climate change on these.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Guest: Dr. Stephanie Zick, Associate Professor at Virginia TechWhen we think of tornadoes, our minds are immediately drawn to the Southern Plains or the Southeast, right? Well the Midwest has also had their fair share of damaging and deadly tornadoes, not just historically but every single year. A lot of research has been focused on our typical “Tornado Alleys” but sometimes the Midwest gets lost to the wayside. However, researchers at Virginia Tech have discovered multiple different breakthroughs in tornadogenesis all throughout our atmosphere over the Midwestern states. Today on the show, we have Dr. Stephanie Zick to break it all down for us…See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.