Kayla McClure
Meteorology 1010
Tracking a Cold Front
1- It is 1500Z surface analysis. There is low air and a cold front coming. There are
two lines and it is going to hit in two different places. Look at the Map located
below.
2- The cold front is located in Canada area and coming down. It is at the point of
Washington, Idaho, Montana, and North Dakota that is the top one. The second
one which is below that is from Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, South Dakota, and
Minnesota and Wisconsin. As they are traveling down I expected Utah to get hit
on Friday 18th 2011.
3- To look at the area that it is going to hit is KSLC which is the Salt Lake City area.
The code is KSLC for where my cold front is getting tracked.
4- Look at the Image below. This image shows what has happened before the storm.
I looked at it at 11:29 November 18th 2011.
In the picture above it shows the effects of the cold front. The cold front consisted of
snow, precipitation, winds, and clouds. As the clouds have stayed and lingered. The rain
started at like 4 on and starting about 6 is when the snow started to come. It was a
constant snow that was throughout the night. It was not very much snow but it was a light
snow that kept going throughout the night. It stopped sometime during the night but after
11. I reason for 11 is because I was up and it was still snowing. So then it passed and the
next day the temperatures were cold and the rain came off and on. There was not a heavy
rain once again but it was light enough to make the grounds wet. I believe that the storm
passed because of colder weather and because of the winds. The cold weather and the
rain came so then the temperature dropped and then the snow came. The winds also
helped make it pretty cold.
MY REFLECTION
My reflection on this assignment is that it takes a lot of time to see if the weather
is going to come. The weather people have these cool tools to see if the storm is going to
come or not. They have pictures and graphs to say they could come around this time.
They made it work. They watch and see. Having to watch the cold front and see if it was
really going to hit Salt Lake City was kind of a pain because it took time to watch and it
took patience. I had no patience to watch the different graphs to see if it was going to
come. So then when I did watch it I give the weather people credit for having to try to be
specific in when a storm is going to come. I thought it would have come earlier but it
came around 4 like I said in my report. I thought it was going to be here around 12 by the
way the weather people were saying it. The pressure and the winds, the precipitation and
the snow all make a difference. If one thing changes then the other can change the
outcome of the weather. They might guess one thing and then it comes to other things.
The pressure drops and then the air gets colder and then it can go from rain to snow, or to
hail, I mean it all changes. So when they are looking at the weather it is hard to predict
they can only know what is going on right at that moment. When the storm finally comes
is when they know what could really happen. Yes there are some things that don’t change
so they got it right on the ball but it depends on what you are looking at and how you are
looking at it. I see how weather people have a hard time of getting the right temperature
or even getting the right weather that is coming. For most part they know what is going
on. Now when I look at the weather on TV I can see the difference I can maybe see when
the weather is going to hit us and what kind of storm it could be, but even I can’t make a
great prediction of what is going to happen. I learned a lot and I plan on that I will keep
my knowledge as I watch the weather to come to school every day and find my clothes
for the day to plan accordingly. I am willing to trust what the weather people have to
know and that they can’t always make the best prediction. I will not yell at them every
time they get the weather wrong or even when they are off by 5 degrees. I will use what I
have learned about cold fronts and use them in my everyday life because I watch the new
every day to decide on different things that day.