Arizona weekly citizen., 1895-04-13
HAZEN AND BIGELow.

These are assistant professors in the sorecasting department of the national weather bureau at Washington. They are universal scholars and of eminent ability. Of more importance than these however, is the fact that they represent two widely differing theories as to the proper basis for weather forecastlng and | they are now engaged in a fight to the finish as to which will win the laurels. do not mean to say that they are openly fighting eachother but that each IS pushing to the front his own peculiar views as to causes of weather changes and as both cannot be right one must fail.
 We are on the eve of important events in meteorology and the public is enor- mously interested, therefore the battle of the giants should attract general at tention.
 It is claimed that 16 per cent more of manufactured articles are used in cold than in warm winters. On the one item of coal about thirty-three millions of dollars are saved by a warm winter.
 Without reliable long rsnge forecasts manufacturers cannot rightly gauge their outputs and therefore hundreds of millions of dollars can be saved by know ing when to expect cold and warm win ters. This is in reference to only one item of the weather and therefore there is no subject of such vast importance to all mankind as that of correct basis for long range weather forecasts.
 Prot. Bigelow holds that there is a 27 days weather period; that this period is divided up into ten minor and two major periods. He states that the records of the magnetic needle conclusively prove that such periods occur in the waves of magnetism that affect the earth and that these waves are felt on every part of the esrth's surface at the same in stant.
 He claims that the weather events for North America occur in western Canada at exactly the same time when the mag- netic events occur throughout the earth and that these weather events then drift eastward across the continent in about four days.
 In the American Meteorological Journal for March Prof. Hagen declares there are no such weather periods and thus the issue is joined.
 At this time l cannot determine which IS right but 1 must notice Prof. Hszen's method of disproving Prof. Bigelow's claims.
 The reader will carefully note that BigeloW's cool and warm waves follow each other from west to east and to dis prove that they repeat in periods of about twenty seven days Hszen takes the average temperature of the whole United States for nine of these periods.
 Any school boy would at once see the fallacy of Hazen's method. Of course the warm and cool waves are always on the continent in about equal numbers and of about equal extent balancing eachother and therefore to take the average of all the stations in the United Slater would bring no result because the weather events do not occur in all parts of the country at the same time.
 The only fair test would be to take the temperatures of all the stations along the line which ought to be reach ed by Bigelow's weather events on the first day of his period and then the temperatures for the day following of the stations that should be reached on the second day of the period and so on through the entire period.
 New Orleans, CincInnsti and Buffalo are supposed to be reached on the third day of Bigelow's period and therefore the temperatures of these places should be used for the third days only-twenty- seven days apart. But Hszen's method is to take the temperature of all stations in the United States to prove Bigelow's wester events do not reach these three cities every twenty-seventh day.
 Besides diagram containing the cur yes of every day for nine of these twenty seven days periods Hagen says: ''If out of one hundred stations fifty show plus three degrees and fifty minus three degrees on any one day of period everyone will admit at once that there would be no uniform heating or cooling indicated on that day" The above quotation shows that I have not misrepresented Hagen. But who does not know that while a cold wave is ID Iowa a warm wave may be in the Ohio valley and if we take a hun dred stations as suggested by Hagen of course they will balance eachothsr add bring no result. But Bigelow's dates may be for warm wave in the Ohio valley and cold wave in Iowa on the same day and can Hszen's method sp- ply?
 A long and careful study of Hazen proves that the above fairly represents his methods when dealing with the -vaothor uOrL of OthSra