498 MONTHLY WEATHER REVIEW O ~B E R , 1024
There was water in the staterooms and even in the captains room on the bridge. The following note was written in the log at about this time: Hurricane winds with high seas. Ship laboring heavily. Taking heavy seas over forward and after decks. The pressure dropped t o its lowest point a t 1 p. m.. 28.05 inches (a test of this barometer at 28 inches showed that i t was reading too high by 0.20 inch, making the corrected reading 37.85 inches). From 11 a. m. t o 2 p. m. the wind blew with hurricane force, and waves were mountainous. After 1 p. m. the pressure rose quickly and by 4 p. m. it was 29.30. A t 5 p. m. there was noted a backing of the wind, although the velocity was still high, nort.li-~~ortheast
10. As the wind continued to back the velocity decreased. By midnight the pressure had risen t o 29.55 and the wind blew froni the northwest with a force of 6.
The following is quoted from the report of the oificial in charge of the Weather Bureau office at Key West,:
The storms center at its nearest approach to Key Wrest was 90 miles distant. This was about noon of the 20th, when the center
Notwithstanding the strong and consistently increasing winds which began during the night of the 19th and which culminated at 2 p. m. of the 20th with a maximum velocity of 66 miles an hour from the southwest, this storm caused no damage in Key West aside from some little damage to trees and shrubbery. There was no damage to shipping whatsoever. This was unusual in the face of a wind that for 17 hours maintained a velocity averaging 51 miles an hour, with gusts ranging from 54 to 74
miles an hour, and can be ascribed only to timely and persistent warnings issued by the Weather Bureau. Taking advantage of these warnings, all vessels, large and small, were made secure, windoas and doors battened, and in a number of cases trees trimmed in order to lessen the wind effect and possibly save them. As a result of warnings broadcast by radio, several vessels Rought refuge in port. All P. & 0. steamers were held on advice from this office. The following vessels were held in ort pending the passage of the storm: Steamers W. F . Btwdell, 3. R. Gordon, Roarroke, Eslrada Pnlina, Henr M . Flagler, Joseph R . Parrolt, Mianti, FPilliam Islam, and dovernor Cobb, and the schooner Mary Thompson. The bureaus work on this hurricane has called forth much praise from outside sources. bore northwest.
$3 7 /.5 0 ci (oz.) NOTES, ABSTRACTS, AND REVIEWS
WETTERVORHERSAQE (WEATHER F0RECASTING)l
This volume is No. XI in the series of natural science ublications brought out by Dr. Ra hael Ed. Leisegang,
structor in meteorology in the University of rnnldurt and has written a number of papers on met.enrologica1 subjects, especially within the last few years. After sketching in Chapter I the development, of
weather forecasting since the time of Dove and indicating the synoptic weather re orts available to European fore-
ing them, t.he author proceeds, in Chapter I-The de-
pendence of the weather on pressure forma.tions and air streams induced thereby-to discuss the prohlenu of weather forecasting from synoptic weather charts. His method of developing the subject is quite naturally that, of an instructor in meteorology. He begins with the fundamental concepts of air niove- ment as dependent upon the pressure distribut.ion with such modifications as are introduced bjr surface friction, the rotation of the earth on its axis, and other influences,
9
hankfurt-am-Main. he author, 8 octor Geor ii, is in-
K
casters, together with t E .e means of collectin and chart-
agraphs. According to Exner, in the original stationary condition the isotherms and the isobars run parallel to each other. North of the line of discontinuity pressure is relatively high; south thereof relatively low. Normally po1a.r air masses have an east-west movement. These winds, how- ever, meet obstacles to their free and unobstructed west- ward movement, as on the east Greenland coast, Spitz- bergen, and elsewhere in high latitudes. The winds are then deflected toward the south by the configuration of the earths surface.
1 Wetterwrhersage, W. Oeotgii, Dreaden und Leipzig, 1924.
Since these masses of cold air by reason of their greater density are associated with higher pressure, the isobars in accordance with the cleflection of the winds become curved toward t.he south. In the advanced stage the tongue of cold air forms more and. more an inclosed center of high pressure with anticyclonic movement. The warm west winds which here have been lifted from the ground by the cold air masses still blow (aloft) over the tongue of cold air and on it.s front side cuerts a suction effect on the lower masses of warm air similar to that observed on the leeside of inountains on the passage t,heroover of t.lie wind. A s a result, this suction effect will protluce on the front! side of the tongue of cold air a dynamic pressure ciiminut.ion which intensifies the already present low pressure thermally caused. On the front side there are supplied to this cyclone thenceforth additional warm air masses. Thus, the cyclonic information acquires new energy through the intensifying of the temperature contrast.. Finally, the up er wind blowing over the tonoue of cold? togclther wit{ the movement of the lower cord and warm air illasses resulting froni the cyclonic formation, prodiice a inigrat.ion toward t.lw east. After the tongue of cold air lias moved eastward of t.he point of invasion the earlier stationary condition gradually reestablishes itself until marked temperature contrasts have again developed, which prnduce a further sudden advance of cold. In this way t.he inrushes of cold and the cyclonic forma- tions become a periodic process which recurs at int.emals at cert,nin definite places on the earth. Since the cold air niasses disengage themselves droplike from the polar reservoir of cold, Exners theory is called the drop theory of cyclones in contrast to Bjerknes wave theor The auttor makes the distinction tliat both the Berknes and the Eamer theories explain the ori in only o / one group of cyclones, viz, that which is foun% in the lower levels-2 to 3 km. where t-he pressure differences me thermally produced. I t is not clear just how a distinction is to be made in uctud forecast,ing between the influence of the two res ective groups-those originat.ing in the lower levels
aii s those having their origin in the stratosphere. The closing chapter on !long-range weather fore- casting, brings forward little that is new or suggestive, perhaps for the very good reason that witsh the exception
OCroBER, 1924 MONTHLY WEATHER REVIEW 499
of the Indian meteorolo cal service no other meteoro- logical institution has eveloped a niethod of making de endable seasonal forecasts. h l e the volume has been prepared with the needs of Euro e m forecasters in mind, it will be helpful to others
are of general occurrence, modified localll, of course, by the distribution of land and water and ot. er peculiarities due to geographic factors.-A. J. IT.
as we P 1, since many of the atmospheric processes described
WEATHER ELEMENTS AFFECTING THE 1924 WINTER- WHEAT CROP IN ILLINOIS
The 1934 winter-wheat crop in Illinois was the poorest in average ield per acre since 1916. Insect pests were
many counties was due to weather conditions. ' h e per- centage, by counties, of the 1934 yield per acre to the 14-year average shows that in eneml tlie yield was good north and west -of the Illinois Siver. Very little winter wheat is grown in the northern counties, where the per- centages are high. On the other hand, the percentages are low in one of the most important producing areas, the Illinois counties in tlie vicinity of St. Louis. There were no adverse weather conditions prior to Jan- uary, and wheat continued in ood condition as a rule. January was a cold month. 8 n the 5th the minimum temperature ranged from -4' to -25O a t the extreme ends of the State, with little or no rotection in the center and south, where the tops were f rozen back. The temperature was less severe in the south. On the 21st it ranged from - 1 lo to - 24' throughout the northern division and much of the central, but with a eneral snow cover. The late-sown wheat was dania e 8 by freezing and thawin during t.he latter half of b b r u a r . M a y was unusua fi y cold and cloud , retarding the a vance of vegetation. The winter's Tamage was progressively worse from north to south, there being considerable abandonment, and a t harvevt time the crop varied in condition from most1 good in thc north to largely poor in the south.-C. J . B oot.
almost neg r igible, so it is inferred that the low vield in
CALIFORNIA FIRE SEASON CLOSED BY TIMELY RAINS
The most disastrous fire season that has occurred in California in a decade was closed this month by timely fall rains. Two ears of markedly deficient rainfall was
coddition. The 1924 fire record sur assed, in number of
year, also one of the driest seasons ever experienced in the State. During the period January 1 to October 20 there were 2,439 forest, brush, and grain fires in California, which burned over 827,000 acres-an area greater than the State of Rhode Island-and caused an estimated loss of over $5,000,000 worth of natural resources and improved Thirty-two per cent of all fires were caused
FYrty. y ightnin and 68 per cent were due to careless acts of man. Of %e man-caused fires, 38 per cent were traced to smokers, largely usem of " tailor-made " cigarettes, and campers were responsible for 13 per cent; incendiaries, 14
per cent; brush burners, 8 per cent; railroads, 6 per cent; lumbering operations, 4 per cent; and misccllan-
eous causes, 17 per cent. Out of the total of 2,439 fires, 1,890 were within or ad- jacent to national forests and 549 were on State or
the outstanding P actor which brought about this critical
fires and total area burned, that o P 1917, a record fire
private lands. Government land burned over amounted to 365,333 acres, or less than 2 per cent of the national forest area of the State. Private and State lands burned totaled 461,668 acres. The United States Forest Service spent $920,000 on fire suppression during the season. Outstanding features of the ,1924 .fire season were: Four fire fighters killed on the fire line; the occurrence of over 100 large fires, ranging from 2,000 to more than
50,000 acres in area: the closure to public use of 10,000,000 acres of national forest land, and restrictions on camping and smoking placed on several million additional acres; the intensive state-wide educational campai n b the fire emergency organization sponsored bv 8 e 8orest Service, State Board of Forestry, and the California De- velopmen t Association, and trhe splendid backing given tlie fire-prevention movement by the press, organizcc tions, and public-s irited citizens.- United States Forest 8emice Cdifornk E istricb New8 Letter, Octo6er 31, IO,%'.&
THE EXTINQUISHINQ OF A FOREST FIRE BY SEA FOG
(Kcprintod from ScieIIce Notes in Soienre, November 21, 1924)
11 heavy drip ing. fog rolled in from the PacZc Ocean
heen burning for days in t4lie Olympic peninsula south- west of Port -4ngeles, Wash. This is the only time recorded in northwest forestry of the occurrence of such
u phenomenon. 1'Vit.h no indication of rain and lacking water with which to fi h t the advance of the flaming menace, foresters watc B ed the fire making progress toward tlie town of Quilcene, beyond which lav valuable t,racts'of big trees, when suddenly the wet fog descended. Like a huge gray cloud it settled down upon the forest, enshrouding everythin . The fire fighters fled in terror lest the become bewjdered and lost on the mountain sides. goon the ungent smell of cedar and hemlock smoke disappenrtd? and by mid nfternoon, when the fog lifted, there remained but a few smoking dead logs, while all about the charred trunks of former merchant- &le trees dripped with water from t.he providential fire extinguisher.
lind put out e ii? ectively a fierce forest fire which had
WEATHER MAPS AT SEA
It may be interesting to recall the successive attempts that have led up to the preparation of daily synoptic weather maps on board ocean steamers.
-4s early as 1907 sporadic radio reports of meteoro- logical observat,ions made on ocean-going vesse 1s were communicated t.0 weather services on shore for use in weather forecasting, but the first organized effort to construct a dail synoptic weather chart a t sea was the one conducted z y br. P. Polis, director of the meteoro- logical obsorvatory of Aachen, Germany, on a voyage from Europe to the United States and return on the steamship Kaiserin dugude Victoria, in August, 1908.' It was not until after the war that the matter was revived, a t which time the National Meteorological Service of France, c.ooperat,ing with the Compagnie GBn6rale Transatlnntique, develo ed a system of collect- ing meteorological reports and) preparing therefrom twice-dad?; spopt.i.c: weather c.harts on the steamship
Jo~cqiie~ C'artier, Captain Chabot. These charts were. based on reports from continental and oceanic areas and were unusually complete in scope and detail. The most
I Polis. P.. Wireless telegraphy in the servlee of modern mcteomlogy, MO. WEATUEB REV.. 36: 407, and ('hart IX. August, ISOS.