The Human METAR

I overheard someone last week that said the following:

“I am so excited to see this fall weather”

I was so upset to hear this, because the south just doesn’t understand what fall really is. Technically speaking there are 3 different versions to the start of fall:

1. Meteorological Fall:  September 1st, 2010 at 12:00 am
2. Autumnal Equinox:  September 22nd, 2010 at 11:09 pm
3. MY VERSION: High does not go above 69.9 and/or Low does not go above 39.9

And according to me: Fall has not arrived yet, even though the Autumnal Equinox is later tonight. Take a look at the forecast temperatures in Asheville:

Some of the high temps are in the 80′s and almost even 90′s!!! In my world, it’s still summer.

Tropical Storm Igor has formed in the Eastern Atlantic. It is forecasted to become a category 2 hurricane by early next week, but it expects to curve northward well before it reaches the mainland of the United States:

courtesy: Weather Underground

And whenever I hear Igor, I think of this:

As of 2pm east coast time Hurricane Earl was a couple of hundred miles off the coast of North Carolina. Its max sustained winds are around 125, which puts Earl in Category 3 status. While it has been moving westward for most of its life, it has begun to move north at 18 miles per hour.  This means that it will not be in Asheville (though I never expected it to be, being 400 miles from the coast).  While landfall is not expected, the western swath of the storm is projected to affect much of the Northeast:

Currently there are Hurricane Warnings for the North Carolina coast, as the storm will be passing by overnight tonight. Another concern could be a near landfall off of Cape Cod tomorrow night into Saturday morning. Because of that the Massachusetts coast, as well as Nantucket/Marthas Vineyard, is ALSO under a Hurricane warning.

Again, while landfall is not expected, it should still pack a punch, with winds up to 7o mph for some coastal areas and high seas. Even though the storm is expected to weaken (in fact it already has, being downgraded from a category 4 to category 3 at the 2pm discussion), it can still do some minor damage so be careful up there.