CyberSleuth: Nudity out on bad hair days

It's a worry.

Icebergs the size of South Auckland, populated by an approximately equal number of displaced penguins, keep breaking off the Antarctic Shelf and wandering north.

Alarmists can check it out at the National Ice Centre [www.natice.noaa.gov].

The latest, which is quite large enough to seek admission to the United Nations, is due off the coast of Brazil later this year, where it will certainly give the anchovies a fright.

So we're not alone in our strange, hot winter. The numbing frosts of my boyhood seem very distant today, legends of a remote South Canterbury ice-age.

Well, we all know about El Nino and his little sister La Nina. Hotter, colder, windier, wetter, drier… it's the most theatrical global condition since the plagues of Egypt.

There'll be bad hair days galore - drought, hail, and a light shower of frogs late afternoon…

Not to mention the hottest world temperatures in 600 years, fires in Indonesia, sandbags in China, killer frosts in Europe and the most rumbustious hurricane ever recorded [Linda, off Mexico].

Thanks to El Nino, even the poor sea-turtles couldn't lay their eggs in Nicaragua this year.

Revisit the meteorological excesses of the past 12 months at www.wcco.com/news/enso, and preview the next installment at the Climate Prediction Centre: nic.fb4.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/index.html

But I refuse to panic.

A little research at www.el-nino.com reveals that almost every year since 1900 has featured the terrible twosome, either singly or together. So what's new?

Besides, it's been worse. Much worse.

Let me remind you of a time when 'weather' meant roiling clouds of methane and ammonia with torrential downpours of acid, while the heavens rang like a gong and the earth boiled like a kettle.

We don't know what weather is.

So if you're going to grizzle, why not just leave? Mars is nice at this time of year.

With the temperature at a bracing -70°F at the equator, though, you're going to need your woollies. Daily Martian weather forecasts will resume shortly at nova.stanford.edu/projects/mgs/dmwr.html, courtesy of the Mars Global Surveyor.

"Fine but chilly, with occasional sandstorms" about sums it up.

Terrestrials should grab their umbrellas and click this way…

WeatherNOW!
www.xtra.co.nz/metservice/index.shtml

User-pays: $3.00 [incl. GST] per visit let's you romp among satellite maps and radar images - but only for 30 minutes, not to your heart's content. There's a Java-powered preview with Walt Disney clouds oozing plump drops of moisture; for the full feature, you need to be an Xtra subscriber.
Irritatingly, the free service at www.aucklandlive.co.nz/news/weather seems to offer only current conditions, and you could probably work those out for yourself.

The Sleuth says: stick with TVNZ, or go to www.met.co.nz/home/PRODUCTS/PUBLIC_FORECASTS.HTML for a slab of industrial Metprose apparently written by the very same journalist who covered the Black Budget of 1958. Personally, I just use cnn.com/WEATHER/html/AucklandNewZealand.html

Severe Weather Safety Guide
www.nssl.noaa.gov/~nws/safety.html

Asks such crucial questions as: "If a tornado was approaching, what would you do?" My answer ["hide under the bed"] was more or less correct. The answer to the flashflood question ["go to higher ground immediately"] also occurred to me.
Preparedness is the key to blizzards: ensure you have not only waterproof matches [to melt snow to drink], but also - I swear this is true - cat litter. Does the SPCA write this stuff? Also, "cover exposed parts of the body". Honestly, did they think I'd go strolling through a blizzard in my undies? Lightning is more problematical. See this girl? She was fried seconds after the picture was taken - note there's no rain falling; lightning can strike miles away from the thunder.

If your hair stands on end, just put your head between your knees - curling up in a foetal ball and trembling seems to work in most situations apart from forest fires. The less limber must take their chances - serve you right for not doing your aerobics.

Links to landslides, mudflows, sinkholes [don't laugh, it could happen to you: two tipplers and their cars were engulfed in a US hotel carpark recently], heatwaves, volcanoes, earthquakes, tsunami…

The Sleuth says: have a nice day.
Email: pete@ihug.co.nz