Fayette County herald. [volume] (Washington [Washington Court House], Fayette County, O. [Ohio]) 1860-1???, 1880-03-04
stOrms Ia the Unlted states.

Professor Loomis has recently pub
lished some results of an elaborate criti-
cal study and comparison of Signal SerV-
ice observations and weather maps,
carried on for long periods to discover
the movements and progressive velOci-
ties of United States storms. Some of
his deductions are of great interest. He
finds that United States storm-centers
after crossing the Rocky Mountains
move towards the southeast until reach
ing the Mississippi basin, when they
incline towards the Lake region with
accelerated speed. The average veloci-
ty of American storms after crossing
the Mississippi, about twenty-five miles
per hour, is sixty per cent greater than
that of European storms. This ap-
pears paradoxical when we remember
that in Europe the westerly winds, un-
Obstructed by any coast range like the
Rocky Mountains running north and
south, attain a more rapid movement
over the Continent than the same winds
can acquire in the United States. But
it appears from Professor Loomis' ex-
animation that our storms when nearing
the lakes, and subsequently, are sub
jected to a powerful propulsion from
the waves of high pressure which close
in behind them while in transit, and the
rapid torrential precipitation of rain in
their front quadrants by which the air
is greatly rareied and a barometric
channel cleared for the free onward
movement.
In Europe it is very rarely that a
storm advances over a thousand miles
in day. But in this country such an
occurrence is much more frequent.
The storm-center of January Z, 1877,
Travelled 1872 miles in tWenty-four
hours, and that of the following week
(January 14-10 Travelled 1,270 miles in
twenty-four hours. The storms which
have been found to make their way at
these terrific speeds across the United
States occur on an average about once
in forty days.
But one of the most remarkable feat
ures of these great hurricanes is their
The tremendous cyclone
of the last-named date passed Mount
without disturbing its
summit, where the Signal Service OBJ
wind-vane recorded steady
wind from one quarter during the prog
ress of the depression at its base.
During one of the fercest "cOld
waves' of high barometric pressure,
the thermometer on the summit (6,000
feet high) showed a higher temperature
than that prevailing at the base, clear
ly indicating that the Arctic wave was
not deep enough to cover the mount
ain. These and similar illustrations
of the vertical proportions of both po-
lar waves and barometric depressions go
to prove that the chief agitation of the
erial ocean is limited to its bottom
strata, leaving the loftier region of the
atmosphere in undisturbed repose, save
when the great upper current from
the equatorial belt is in the ascendency.
AS many of the great storms which
sweep over the United States are under
the control of barometric pressures ly-
ing outside of our national territory,
Professor Loomis points out the neces-
3ity of extending the Signal Service OBJ
jervations to extra-territorial stations,
lot only with a view to their complete
but also to the practical
of weather-telegraphy.