Kevin Myatt

Latest entries from the Weather Journal blog

• Weather Journal remains on break
• Coastal low prompts Southwest Virginia flooding
• Hurricane Ida: Something extraordinary may be happening

About Kevin

Kevin Myatt grew up in Arkansas to the tune of tornado sirens and the rhythm of hailstones, aspiring to be a meteorologist before his studies and career were turned to journalism instead. Though he often chases storms, he prefers living in the cooler, more tranquil weather of the Blue Ridge. He moved to Roanoke in 1999 to take a job on the copy desk of The Roanoke Times; writing headlines and editing copy is his principal work for the newspaper today.

Each May, Kevin assists Pulaski County High School / Virginia Tech meteorology instructor Dave Carroll in leading college and high school students to the Plains to observe severe weather firsthand. The accounts of many of his storm chases can be found here on the storm chasing page of his weather blog on roanoke.com.

Kevin was an editor for "Hurricanes and the Middle Atlantic States," a book written by D.C.-area weather enthusiast Rick Schwartz and published by Blue Diamond Books that documents hurricanes striking the mid-Atlantic states since colonial times.

The Weather Journal column began in 2003 and appears on Friday's Virginia section front in The Roanoke Times. The Weather Journal blog began in 2006 and follows weather day-by-day between the larger columns.

A look at global data on climate

Weather is a study in contrasts.

Friday's Roanoke Times included an Associated Press article about how worldwide ocean temperatures in July were the warmest they have been in 130 years of record-keeping.

It also included a column of mine that briefly noted the coolest July on record, dating to 1895, in six states just to our north and northwest, something I delved into in greater detail on Aug. 12.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's latest monthly climate statement vividly illustrates air-temperature contrasts around the world that were present in July. It noted temperatures in July of 4 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit above normal in Europe, northern Africa and western North America, while at the same time temperatures were 4 to 7 degrees below normal over the eastern United States, central Canada and southern South America.

Air masses, rather than spread out evenly with moderate temperatures, tend to lump together in pockets of extreme warmth and cold. The various jet streams that drive storms around the world thread around these pockets of heat and cold like belts around pulleys.

Warm oceans can heat air temperatures in certain regions, but they can also provide more energy for large storm systems, and not just those of a tropical nature.

Boundaries between cool air temperatures over land and warm areas over the ocean are ripe for the development of large low pressure systems that can spread wide swaths of heavy rain and/or snow. That's something to keep in mind as we move toward fall and winter.