Put a little popular culture angle into an obscure (obscure, that is, in any objective rather than emotional realm) meteorology report and suddenly a bit of filler becomes a lively yarn. On Saturday at the AP general-assignment reporter Justin Juozapavicius filed – from Tulsa – on a small adjustment in last year’s US weather as compiled by NOAA’s National Climate Data Center in North Carolina. It concludes that last year’s scorchers indeed had the hottest state-level US summer in recorded history, but the winner, which means loser to those who went through it and especially farmers and water managers, was not Texas as had been tentatively asserted. It was just to the north, Oklahoma.
Juozapavicius (whose name, incidentally, is Lithuanian near as I can tell) put the story in the bragging rights, as in Cowboys-vs-Longhorns, frame. Smart move. It gives a folksy, grounded flavor to the story. He also has a sense for narrative rhythm and selects his sources widely and sensibly: A rancher/farmer from each state, the chief at NCDC’s climate monitoring branch, a nurseryman, a man in the Ok. state climatologists’s office. The story further has a historically significant datum – while by setting a record it automatically exceeds anything in the data bank, it is locally significant and thus merits mention that the new one finally supplants the Dust Bowl years of the 30s that were seared into the region’s collective memory as the archetype of heatwaves.
No other general news outlet that I can find staffed this story separately, even as a follow. The Oklahoman (on line NewsOK) used AP. Ditto the Dallas Morning News. However a local blogger at her Green Oklahoma, Lisa Sharp describes this news and adds a kicker – February last year had the coldest, snowiest day in state history.
Grist for the Mill: Mesonet (OK state climatologists site) Hottest Oklahoma Summer ;
Local weather aside: Over the weekend while attending a meeting I met the online science editor at Physics Today, Charles Day, and gave him a lift to a BART station so he could get to SF before flying today back later today to DC. Chatting, I exaggerated the nature of our sublime local weather just a bit by saying it never rains here in June – not till October should we expect more, either. Should’ve told the truth. Make that rarely in June. It’s been coming down pretty good here in Berkeley since the sun came up. I talked about weather and he gave me the scoop on neutrino mixing angles. Those are different grades of information. I am edified; he’s perhaps on a sidewalk without umbrella.
– Charlie Petit
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