The dispute that has brought Canada's two biggest railways to a standstill could soon be over. Labour Minister Steve MacKinnon announced Thursday afternoon that he's sent the dispute to binding arbitration.
Students from Jasper will be able to return to in-person learning on Sept 17. The school year for all three schools in Jasper will be delayed as work continues to clean up in the aftermath of July's wildfire.
The state lawmakers are asking Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to investigate. Their concerns stem from a May report by Spectrum News about Colorado-based Third Future Schools, where Mike Miles served as CEO before leading Houston’s school district.
In brief: Thursday is still going to feel very hot across Houston, but by this weekend we’ll return to temperatures in the mid-90s with a slight chance of rain. Next week we’re going to see partly cloudy days, with highs in the low- to mid-90s, and widespread showers. And then, all of a sudden, we’re into September.
Past peak summer?
Golly, I sure hate to write that we’re probably done with the worst of summer, because one never wants to tempt Mother Nature. However, we just experienced a stretch of six 100-degree days (we may add one more today, although I wouldn’t bet on that). High temperatures peaked on Tuesday and Wednesday, reaching 102 degrees at Bush Intercontinental Airport. It’s going to be difficult to top that.
The last week has not been any fun, in terms of hot temperatures. (National Weather Service)
We know for sure that Houston highs are on a clear down slope for the rest of this month. Although we certainly can hit 100 degrees in September, at this point the odds are fairly low that we see another sustained stretch of brutally hot weather. I’m not ready to say we’re done with triple digits, but I really do believe we’re past the worst of the summer of 2024 in terms of heat.
Thursday
Today is still going to be really hot, of course. High temperatures will reach the upper 90s today, and some inland locations may hit 100 degrees. But we should be slightly cooler than on Wednesday. There is, perhaps, a 10 percent chance of showers this afternoon. Winds will be light, increasing to 5 to 10 mph from the southeast this afternoon. Lows tonight will drop to around 80 degrees.
Friday
Skies will again be mostly sunny, but for most of Houston highs will likely peak in the mid- to upper-90s. Some scattered showers will also be possible starting in the morning hours, and persisting into the afternoon with daytime heating. Overall rain chances will be about 20 degrees.
Saturday and Sunday
Overall skies should be mostly sunny this weekend, but there likely will be a few clouds during the afternoon. Most locations should see highs in the vicinity of the mid-90s. Rain chances will be on the order of 20 to 30 percent daily, mostly driven by the sea breeze. Lows will remain warm, but should start dropping into the upper 70s.
We’ll have one more very hot day before temperatures start to feel more comfortable. (Weather Bell)
Next week
As high pressure backs off further, we’ll see our region open up to moisture from the Gulf of Mexico next week. This will lead to healthy, daily rain chances on the order of 50 percent. Generally, next week, we can expect high temperatures in the low- to mid-90s, with partly cloudy skies, and periodic passing showers with embedded downpours. The likelihood of rain will be greater near the coast, but everyone should have a chance of seeing some showers. We will likely remain in this pattern through most of next week, and possibly into the weekend.
Tropics
The Atlantic tropics are quiet. In case you missed it, we published a long post from Matt yesterday on why that is, and how long it will last.
CHICAGO—Informing the crowd at the Democratic National Convention that he had come from a distant and unimaginable realm ruled by robotic beings, Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz unveiled a new retro-futurist persona this week during a speech in which he dispensed with his folksy image. “Greetings, citizens of America, it is I—Artemus!” the Minnesota governor said as bulbs lit up on his apparently homemade silver jumpsuit and he described his upbringing in the “electrorepublic of Democritron,” departing from his previous homespun, small-town identity. “My creator, the mad scientist Dr. Eustis Humphrey, sent me back through the Chronopneumatic Chamber to this very year to deliver a message: The Republicans are mounting their interstellar fleet of zeppelins and heading to your star system to destroy your mortal way of living. Heed my words!” Walz’s appearance on stage was immediately followed by a screening of a 45-minute black-and-white silent film titled Artemus Versus The Villains Of Atomica.
Coming into this hurricane season, there were breathless forecasts calling for anywhere from 20 to even 30 named storms from some folks. Government forecasts were more conservative but even they were the most active we’ve ever seen from NOAA. Colorado State, too. So, as we sit here on August 21st with next to nothing showing up in modeling for the next 7 to 10 days, it’s reasonable for the general public to ask questions about those forecasts.
One of our potential fail modes was if La Niña developed too slowly. Indeed, the pace of the La Niña development this season, while uneven, has generally lagged the strongest projections. At least officially. Here’s a look at the May 1st European model ensemble outlook for the ENSO 3.4 region, the box of temperatures we look at to basically designate La Niña or El Niño.
The spring forecasts for La Niña have (to this point) turned out a little too aggressive. But directionally, they’ve been fairly correct. (ECMWF)
We should begin closing in on an official La Niña designation in the next month or two, but we aren’t quite there yet. Keep in mind, this is by no means a perfect representation of things, and sometimes the atmosphere can behave more Niña-like even if we aren’t officially there yet. But this has not developed as aggressively as some modeling showed in developing in spring.
So, at a very, very distant level, perhaps that has something to do with it. Michael Lowry, in his excellent daily newsletter pointed out yesterday that wind shear has become almost too extremely reversed this month. Typically, during a La Niña, there is more of an easterly component from the wind that counteracts or reduces the usual west to east winds that can cause shear in the Atlantic, detrimental to hurricane development. In a twist of fate, there’s so much of an easterly component to the upper level winds this year that it’s actually causing easterly shear. Otherwise, we might be a good bit busier at the moment. If you look at the basin as a whole since June 1st, winds have been generally lighter than usual in the Caribbean and much of the Atlantic and a bit stronger than usual in the southwest Atlantic and in the Gulf.
Upper-level winds have been generally below average this summer in some key tropical development areas. As such, we’ve accumulated some bang for our buck this season so far. (NOAA PSL)
Let’s dig a little deeper. One thing that’s legitimately fascinating to me right now is what’s happening in terms of upper level background support in the atmosphere. Using a variable known as velocity potential, we can see that in historically active hurricane seasons, you would expect to see a significant area of rising air in the Indian Ocean, bleeding a bit into Africa (green on the top map below). Opposite to that, there would be a significant area of sinking air in the Eastern Pacific Ocean (brown colors below). Why is this important? In order to generate an active outbreak of storms in the Atlantic, you need disturbances tracking across Africa, which tend to get supported by rising air over and just east of there. You also prefer to see the Pacific undergoing sinking air, as a way to keep it from ‘robbing’ the favorable conditions for storminess. Sinking air suppresses thunderstorm development and tends to dry out the air a bit.
So what’s going on right now? So far this August, we’ve actually *had* what we would expect from a hyperactive season in the Indian Ocean. Click to enlarge the image below.
A comparison of velocity potential in hyperactive seasons (top) vs so far this August (bottom). While we have what we’d expect for a period of high activity, something is out of phase inhibiting things. (Eric Webb/NOAA)
We have a ton of rising air in the Indian Ocean this month (purple & blue on the bottom map above). We have that extending into Africa. This is what you’d expect for a busy season. Where it differs, however is exactly where the sinking air (red/orange in the bottom panel above) is located. In a typical hyperactive season, this is focused over the Eastern Pacific. This year, it’s focused on the eastern side of South America. This is Matt speculating wildly here, but: I suspect that we’re seeing the right ingredients in place, but I think we are seeing them out of phase. The rising air in the Indian Ocean extends deeper into the Pacific, and there is more of a neutral Eastern Pacific signal right now. This is helping boost activity in the Pacific.
Today’s 7 day outlook in the Pacific includes Hurricane Gilma and two other disturbances that are likely to organize. (NOAA NHC)
The problem with the tropics is that support like this generally moves from west to east, and eventually this will change. So the quiet now may change in a very, very quick way come September when this (presumably) shifts. For now, the Atlantic is still seeing rampant dust and a slightly displaced intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) which is sending disturbances off Africa too far north and into dust. So they die off earlier. This too will change.
Widespread Saharan dust (pink, red, orange) extends across much of the Atlantic, and as disturbances are coming off farther north than usual, they’re hitting the dust head on. (University of Wisconsin CIMSS)
In fact, if you look at the forecast of African Easterly Waves (AEWs) from the latest GFS model, you can see this southward shift approaching heading into the next week or two. The waves lined up over Africa are about 5 to 10 degrees farther south in latitude about 4 days from now, which means they will emerge farther south and in more of a traditional area less exposed to Saharan dust in late August and September.
Tropical waves are going to begin emerging off Africa farther south than they have been recently, which should ultimately lead to a boost in activity heading into September. (Quinton Lawton, University of Miami)
So, yes, things are almost certainly going to pick up soon.
Despite perception, this season’s current accumulated cyclone energy is running nearly 3 times higher than usual! We’ve amassed as much ACE so far this season as we’d typically see by the peak day of hurricane season (September 10th). We’ve done this on the backs of only five storms so far, three of which have been hurricanes, and one of which (Beryl) smashed early season records in the Caribbean and Atlantic.
Accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) this season has been historically high despite the perceived slow start to the season. (Kim Wood/University of Arizona)
So despite the perception that this season has been slow to start, it actually has not been. In fact, 2024 is in rarefied air in terms of ACE to date. This perception might have to do with storm inflation, or the idea that we are naming more storms today than we did, say, 20 or 30 years ago. In 2020, basically the benchmark for recent historically active seasons, today marked the formation date for Hurricane Laura, the 12th named storm of the season. Here we are in 2024 sitting at five, and it’s no wonder the perception is skewed. Despite having more than twice as many storms to this point in 2020, we only had half the ACE (26 vs. 55 this year). 2020 kept churning out mostly sloppy storms until Laura, and then things got nasty. We’ve had three legitimate hurricanes this year and only about one “throwaway” storm (Chris). The takeaway message here is that: We can make up ground in September very, very fast. Very fast.
So, no, this season’s extremely active hurricane seasons have not been a bust so far, and they probably won’t end up being a bust overall. We’ve had a “bang for our buck” season so far with quality storms over quantity as, say, in 2020. And while we are in a lull now, the setup is probably going to change in 7 to 10 days to allow things to crank up in September. Never call it a bust. If it is one, we can discuss why in November. For now, use this quiet time to review your hurricane preparedness plans and supply kits. And stay tuned here for the latest through September.
In brief: We’re nearing the end of peak summer in Houston, but today is still going to be excessively hot with temperatures in the low 100s. By Thursday we’ll see the start of a slow cooling trend, which will eventually bring us cloudier skies and improved rain chances by early next week.
Wednesday
High temperatures on Tuesday officially reached 102 degrees at Bush Intercontinental Airport, the warmest temperature recorded so far this year. Conditions today will be similar, with mostly sunny skies and very hot temperatures. Winds will be light, from the southeast. Lows tonight will provide scant relief, likely falling only to about 80 degrees. The good news is that today will probably be the hottest day for the rest of 2024. I cannot guarantee that, of course. But probably.
One more day of excessive heat. (Weather Bell)
Thursday
High pressure that’s been situated over West Texas will finally start to back away, and this will slowly start to moderate our conditions. It won’t happen right away, of course, as highs on Thursday could still reach 100 degrees in some locations. But it’s a start. I think there also will be a chance of some isolated showers and thunderstorms, although overall chances will remain quite low, on the order of maybe 10 percent.
Friday
Expect sunny and hot weather, with highs in the upper 90s. Rain chances will be about 20 percent, with isolated to scattered showers possible along the sea breeze.
Saturday and Sunday
Highs this weekend will be in the mid- to upper-90s and precise temperatures at your location will depend on the extent of cloud cover and whether any showers pop up during the afternoon hours. The bottom line is that it will be hot, but not excessively so. Low temperatures should fall back into the upper 70s.
More seasonable weather returns by Friday for late August, in Houston. (Weather Bell)
Next week
As high pressure moves further away, our weather will become increasingly influenced by the Gulf of Mexico. This means we should see partly cloudy days next week, with high temperatures likely in the vicinity of the mid-90s. Daily rain chances will increase throughout the week, starting in perhaps the 40 percent range on Monday, and rising to likely by the second half of the week. We’re not looking at a total washout by any means, but hopefully we’ll see some cooling rains that bring needed moisture to our soils. As I was discussing with a friend yesterday, it really does not get a whole lot better than that in Houston, in August.
Tropics
Nothing is happening. Later this morning we’ll have a post from Matt to explain why that is—during a season which seasonal hurricane forecasters predicted a hyperactive year in the Atlantic.
When I was 4 or 5, I tended to take most things literally. So I thought getting fired meant that if you were bad at your job, you were taken out of the building and set on fire as a punishment.
2. The talk show guest
I always assumed I would be interviewed by Johnny Carson as a guest on The Tonight Show (U.S. late night TV talk show). I watched other interviewees and tried to figure out what I would wear, the best way to sit, how best to be gracious to Ed McMahon sitting on my other side, how much to laugh vs. be serious, etc.
I never thought about what professional accomplishment I was being interviewed FOR, I just assumed that any job would eventually lead to a Tonight Show appearance.
3. The toll booth
When people asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up, I always said I wanted to work in a toll booth. My parents finally got tired of that and investigated why that was my dream job. I thought they kept the money.
4. The 401(K)
I thought a 401K had something to do with $401,000 (and not a tax code). Like, when you retire that’s the amount you get in your retirement account.
5. Meetings
I thought being someone who was constantly in meetings was the gold standard and would be really cool/impressive.
6. The geometry professor
My dad was a college professor in a field related to geometry. This should have been a really easy thing for a child to understand: I had teachers, I knew what shapes were, he was a teacher who worked with shapes.
Except I never saw him actually teach, just office hours (when I was waiting for him to pack up and a student or professor would engage him in a last-minute question). So he would talk with them while drawing something on the whiteboard, then they’d mark something on his picture, then he’d add something else.
So I grew up with the vague idea that my dad played really fancy games of tic-tac-toe for a living.
7. Language confusion
Mine were mostly language confusion: believing that “blue collar” and “white collar” referred to actual shirt colors you were required to wear, and confidently saying my dad was “blue collar” on days when he wore a blue shirt. Likewise, believing that work done without wearing a shirt with a (white or blue) collar was…still work, but somehow different (like maybe not taxed)?
Also that “working under the table” meant scrubbing the floor under furniture.
8. The rings
My dad would sometimes take client calls at home and end the call by telling them that he’d “give you a ring” later. I thought he meant an actual, physical ring that you’d wear on your finger. I didn’t even associate this with proposals or marriage – I just thought that giving each other rings was just something that adults did as part of business.
9. Day-to-night
When I was in my teens/early 20s, it felt like all the magazines ever routinely had a spread on “day-to-night” outfits. How to turn your boring office garb into something fashionable and fun for a night on the town. Usually consisted of swapping pants for a skirt and changing from high heels to higher heels. It was the ultimate grown ass woman goal to be the office-to-happy hour chameleon with the right outfit for every occasion all in one day.
I must say, even when I was a younger person who attended regular happy hours, this vital wardrobe transition period was… not a thing.
10. The entrepreneur
Coming from a family of small business owners, I was under the impression that the *only* work was starting a business. I distinctly remember telling a cousin “Doing anything else is just to stay busy until you start your business.”
11. Sack races
I thought having company picnics with family sack races was going to be a much bigger part of working life than it is. I blame all those 80s/90s shows where somehow the outcome of the family sack race would determine who got promoted.
12. The bike
When my daughter was three, she saw me go off on my bike every morning and arrive home on my bike, and she was shocked one day when I took her to the office where I worked. We did a little bit of investigation and it turned out she assumed I was just cycling around all day whilst she was at nursery.
Toronto, ON – A millennial Toronto couple who recently moved into a trendy new tiny home is enjoying their first tiny fight about a tiny affair. “My wife discovered a tiny photo on my phone,” explained Josh Geary. “I had left my tiny phone on the tiny dining room table and she asked me whose […]
QUEEN’S PARK – Ontario Premier Doug Ford has announced the imminent shutdown of a local safe injection site in favour of a new retail outlet devoted solely to alcohol consumption. “I have heard the pleas of average Ontarians sick and tired of these sanctuaries to substance abuse littering our fine communities. We need proper treatment […]
VIRGO SUPERCLUSTER—Cursing with frustration at the unforeseen inconvenience, 8 billion residents of Earth told reporters Wednesday that the planet had been towed and impounded after being illegally parked in the Milky Way. “Oh goddammit, that’s my whole day ruined,” said 43-year-old Dan Levitz, one of billions of Earth dwellers who awoke to the sound of their home planet being hauled away for parking overnight in a restricted section of the solar system. “It’d been fine there for 2 million years, but suddenly they put up a sign and it’s not okay? Jesus Christ, we slapped a permit on Africa and everything, so I don’t know what they want. This fucking sucks.” A flustered humanity then went on to question how they were supposed to cobble together 250 space bucks.
PITTSBURGH—Citing the 87-year-old’s allegations that Prussian immigrants were destroying the fabric of his neighborhood and responsible for all the crime in town, a local family reported Wednesday that their grandfather Steve Bierko appeared to be racist against a country that no longer exists. “He keeps calling these people ‘cabbage eaters’ and claims they’re poisoning America, but I don’t know if people are even coming here from Prussia anymore,” said granddaughter Amanda Henner, adding that Bierko blamed workers from a country that hasn’t existed for 77 years for stealing all the good-paying bricklaying jobs and butcher jobs in the Pittsburgh area. “Grandpa is always going on about how they should round up the Prussian immigrants and send them back to the Baltic swamps. Is that where Prussia was? He even got suspicious of my boyfriend just because his name is Carl. He said he smells like herring.” At press time Bierko was complaining that Prussian propaganda was the only reason people love Babe Ruth so much.
A few thousand protesters marched toward the site of the Democratic National Convention to voice their opposition to the war in Gaza, with activists hoping to amplify their progressive message before the nation’s top Democratic leaders. What do you think?
“If they really hated human rights abuses, they wouldn’t tempt the Chicago Police Department like this.”
Paul Bouis, Trombonist
“I prefer to have my convictions ignored from the comfort of home.”
Maggie Saam, Unemployed
“The DNC is hardly the place for political grandstanding.”
Last night, at the end of that night's DNC activities, as part of their coverage, PBS had a panel of journalist talk about highlights and lowlights, and one of the panelist - a Black/African American maybe in his 30's - sorry I don't remember his name - was choked up over Michelle Obama's speech - [African Americans] don't fall forward - and other struggles. In tears: "I feel seen". And this makes me happy. That maybe there are these people who just at least feel seen.
CHICAGO—In a deliberate counter-programming effort aimed at one of the biggest weeks of the 2024 election, former President Donald Trump reportedly hoped to disrupt the Democratic National Convention news cycle Tuesday by eating a live rat on television. “America, I am absolutely sick and willing to do anything to get your attention,” said the Republican presidential nominee, standing in a Chicago alley near the dumpster where he had caught a large rodent by its tail and, in a desperate attempt to draw interest away from the major political event, was now lowering the creature’s wriggling body toward his open mouth. “I’m in their city, pretty much outside their convention, and I am eating a rat. Would Kamala do this? I don’t think so. I really don’t think so at all.” At press time, a weeping Trump demanded his aides keep filming even as he regurgitated the rat’s half-digested corpse.
DALLAS—Shooting awkward looks at each other as he spoke about his upcoming months of radiation treatment, puzzled coworkers of local man Benjamin Sharp admitted Tuesday they had no idea why he was telling them he has cancer. “This cancer stuff all seems kind of personal, and I’m not sure why he wanted to have a whole discussion about it when it doesn’t have anything to do with the project we’re working on,” said marketing manager Levi Kautzman, one of several employees at Tidewater Printing and Supply who speculated that there must be some kind of HR policy that prohibits the sharing of private medical information. “Cancer is terrible, of course, but we’re not this guy’s support system. We just work here. Frankly, I don’t think details about how your disease has metastasized, spread to the liver, and left you with a 10% chance of survival are an appropriate topic for the workplace.” Kautzman added that he would never talk to his coworkers that way, observing that he had not once engaged in an unprofessional conversation about how his son had been abducted two years ago and still had not been found.
CHICAGO—Grabbing the worker’s sleeve and stopping him in his tracks, an increasingly concerned Tim Walz reportedly asked a Democratic National Convention volunteer Tuesday where the giant corn dog stand was. “Excuse me, sir—I seem to have missed the jumbo corn dog stand,” said the Minnesota governor and vice presidential nominee, who explained that he had walked seemingly “everywhere” around the event venue and still had yet to come across a single place where he could purchase the foot-long, deep-fried food. “I hope I’m not too late. They didn’t run out already, did they? Gosh, that would be just awful. Say, while you’re at it, I’m parched. Could you also point me in the direction of the lemonade shake-ups?” At press time, Walz had reportedly missed his own speech while walking laps around the United Center in a frantic search for corn dogs.
CAMBRIDGE, MA—Expressing frustration that they didn’t understand the challenges associated with his job, philosopher Henry Taylor told reporters Tuesday that his friends were constantly pitching him ideas for dilemmas. “I swear, every time I’m hanging out at a friend’s house or out to dinner, somebody has a couple drinks and starts regaling me with this ‘amazing’ idea they have for a complex ethical thought experiment, and I just have to smile and nod,” said Taylor, confirming that even people he had just met would frequently corner him to discuss a half-baked idea they had about free will or the nature of evil. “Half the time it’s crap like, ‘My family is so weird, they could totally be part of a paradox!’ Uh-huh, sure, buddy. Why don’t I go ahead and put that right into my next symposium? Honestly, everybody thinks they can be a philosopher, but just because something metaphysically resonant happened to you doesn’t mean it would make a good dilemma.” Taylor added that if he ever heard a good idea, he would immediately plagiarize it and deny he had done so without any guilt or remorse.
