weather

The latest snowfall of any kind I remember growing up in Iowa was around April 15 -- but that was flurries. Today Iowa woke up in a blanket of mid-April snow in the same week that much of the nation faced numerous record lows and crop failure. Florida fared fine, and we even had a slight easing of our drought last night.

Many of you likely remember the movie "The Day After Tomorrow", which was in theaters just a couple years ago. While the hundred-foot tidal waves and stratosphere-sucking storms were pure fiction, there is some truth to the basic premise -- the collapse of the ocean conveyor belt in the Atlantic. RealClimate has an excellent explanation of the effect here.

As the RealClimate article mentions, there are indications that the thermohaline circulation has decreased by as much as 30% in recent times. So, I'm keeping a wary eye on the weather and its relation to the melting of Greenland, especially given that we're seeing record cold temperatures for the month (not just a particular day).

Continuing with the discussion of weather effects from a couple posts ago, there are many other requirements we can define.

Jeff pointed out that we need to more carefully examine how much rain falls during the growing season, rather than just the whole year’s average. I’m looking for the data on that for our selected Iowa location and I’ll get back to you.

In the following draft requirements, the term “withstand” may need some further definition. The understanding of what withstanding something may vary from person to person – some might consider it to mean every part of the structure and farm stays intact, and some might imagine it means only the core structure must survive. Any thoughts on a better way to define this term?