Have you ever taken a hot air balloon ride? Ballooning has everything to do with the weather. Ballooning and Riding the Weather |AccuWeather.com gives a quick video lesson in ballooning. You'll find out why dawn and dusk are the best times to fly, how the pilot gauges the ground wind speed for landing and a lot of other ballooning weather trivia.
Every year a list of names for hurricanes is generated. By who? And how do they come up with these names and when do they retire them? This short video over at AccuWeather explains.
The video cites the book Storm (California Legacy) by George R. Stewart (1895-1980, a professor of English at the University of California Berkeley) which initiated the custom of giving storms feminine names. The book chronicles a Pacific storm called Maria in 12 chapters, one for each day in the life of the storm.
Since 1953, Atlantic tropical storms have been named from lists originated by the National Hurricane Center. They are now maintained and updated by an international committee of the World Meteorological Organization.
Originally, only women's names were used, but in 1979, men's names were introduced and are currently alternated with the women's names. The lists are re-cycled every six years, so the 2011 list will be used again in 2017. The only time that there is a change in the list is in the event of a devastating storm. Several names have been changed since the lists were created.
Macworld has a really great review of this weather program called WX.
Application developers know a basic truth: people are obsessed with the weather. The slew of weather widgets and apps for both the Mac and iPhone are testament to this fact. Wx is another entrant into the crowded meteorological app field. It brings with it much power and a slightly odd user interface.
Wx can help you decide if you should bring an umbrella to work with you, or it can tell you the current temperature readily either in the dock, in the main window of the app, or in a floating mini display. But Wx is for anyone who's serious about the weather. You can track up to 20 locations by entering a zip code, city/state combination, Latitude/Longitude, or by clicking on a point on a Google map (neat way to get a specific location without knowing the Latitude/Longitude).
Bigsool’s WeatherStation Free is a app for the Apple iPad that turns the iPad into a weather station. If you think about having an iPad stand - then you can just leave the iPad up to enjoy the weather station info. This is a very compelling interface, and the data is supplied by NOAA. I can imagine in the future a weather station interfacing with some weather gear from my backyard instead of a service, but still - amazing.
Track Hurricane Hannah - Track Hurricanes On Stormpulse
Techcrunch is featuring a new service called Stormpulse. Want to know when that hurricane in your area will pass by or tear your roof off? Stormpulse has the info.
Wonder where Hurricane Ike will hit or when Tropical Storm Hanna will pass? Hurricane season has lots of people glued to the Weather Channel to catch the latest updates on developing storms. But why wait for the weatherman to tell you what is going on when you can check for yourself online? One of the best places to do that is Stormpulse. (Google Earth is another one). Stormpulse shows active hurricanes and tropical storms in the Atlantic. And the graphics are better than TV because you can play around with them.
At Sony's recent press conference, SCE president Kaz Hirai revealed new software called "Life With PlayStation,". It's a virtual globe that can be explored to reveal weather and news. We're excited to see Sony go the more realistic route. Though we like our Wii weather - it's a bit cartoony.
Storm Chasers from National Geographic - Forces of Nature
We're recently been watching several storm chaser videos. The excerpt below we found on YouTube, gives you a taste of the weather excitement. We think both the National Geographic - Forces of Nature and the National Geographic - Tornado Intercept are pretty solid, and recommend you checking them out. In our opinion - enjoying storm chasing from the comfort of your couch is the way to go after getting into a few scrapes ourselves trying out the hobby.
This just has to be seen. We were always under the impression that weather forecasters had a little more moxie than this guy has when faced with a simple roach on the ground that walks by while forecasting. Imagine what would happen if he actually had to give the weather forecast on location?
In what can only be called the oddest yet I can't stop watching weather forecast we've every seen, Weather Angels provides a daily forecast with meteorologists of the hot model persuasion. We don't condone this type of weather forecast, but it is really popular, and it is safe for work. View if you dare...
Oh Canada - how different you really are. The Weather Network, a channel watched by more than eight million Canadians each week, has been granted permission to branch out into comedy, drama and documentaries. Canada's broadcast regulator yesterday gave Pelmorex Communications Inc., owner of the Weather Network, a licence to operate the Environment Network, which will focus on science and weather-related issues. The company pitched the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission last fall on a new cable channel with shows such as The Weather & You and Climates of the World.
"It's a very topical subject that is of great interest to the Canadian public," said Pierre Morrissette, chief executive officer of Pelmorex. "The categories that this covers - from global warming, climate change, droughts, floods, forest fires, earthquakes and tsunamis, water quality and quantity - the list goes on and on."
A rather interesting video that you can hear the crew of a ship riding through a rather large storm in the Drake Passage. I think this video helps ensure I won't be making the trip to Antarctica anytime soon.
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Weather and Hot Air Ballooning 
by George R. Stewart (1895-1980, a professor of English at the University of California Berkeley) which initiated the custom of giving storms feminine names. The book chronicles a Pacific storm called Maria in 12 chapters, one for each day in the life of the storm. 
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