writeaboutwarming

April 18, 2011 – Two states of which I have formerly been a resident are enduring weather that nearly defies description. North Carolina experienced 60-plus tornado touchdowns over the past weekend, a large number of them in the Raleigh area, where we used to live. Having grown up in the Midwest, I long since became accustomed to tornadoes as being representative of “typical” spring weather. However, that meant in “Tornado Alley,” a swath of prairie land that ran from Texas up through Wisconsin. While some of the usual places were hard hit this time around – I’m referring here to Oklahoma and Kansas – I don’t think of North Carolina as tornado country. However, my expectations rely upon decades of weather memory that are based on climate behavior that conformed with known patterns and trends. We are now in a transitional period, and the old rules don’t apply. Then there’s Texas. By every account, Texas weather is on a bender, the Forest Service helping to battle 700,000 acres of fires ...