Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1901-04-23

PTRC5iASED OUT OF TOWN.
cHARLEZrON, w. Va.-Hotei huiihei
w AsTf SGroN. D. C-Queen News
Stand, National Hotel.
a WORTHLESS WEATHER SERVICE.
Events. especially of recent occur
renee in the Ohio valley. accumuiate
Tending to prove that our weather pu-
reau as at present conducted is aD-
solutely worthless. The following
cuiticfsm from Pittsburg is eminently
just and timely:
COMPLAINTS have become general over
the peculiar failure of the weather bureau
to send out some warning OF the Hooo
rriaaV night L. is true that 1rspectioh
of a man with its technical lines might
have suggested to the initiated some no.
tion Of an impending flood, but the official
sims regularly furnished the newspapers
that night contained no definite statement
of an expected rise A landslide that
night was a natural sequence to the I'M
usual rainfall, but there was not the gov
eminent bulletin forecasting nooo'
which rivermen and citizens generally
have become accustomed, to read. No ex-
rlanotion is youchsafed for the curious
oversight. People on Saturday read about
noon or were informed by policemen, OF
danger Had the usual Information peen
given out, the time for precaution would
have been increased ten hours, and even
trains lea ing at midnight Friday could
have carried the warnings,
The weather bureau is closed at incon-
yenient hours When the last cipher tele-
gram arrives no map is made, but the
forecast is furnished by the Associated
Press Information already given may not
agree with it, but there is no chance Tor
correction. The local office at night Is
Haid to be conducted mainly to keep rec
ords and not for the benefit of the public,
which is the motive ascribed in Congress
for the maintenance of the bureau. Riv-
ernen saw that if late kilograms would
have brought news of the flood Friday
night the bureau should have been open
to receive and bulletin them. The fact Is
of common statement here that river re-
ports are twelve hours old, and only
when a crisis actually is at hand does the
bureau awaken to the importance or
ample information.
Not only did the weather bureau give
us no warning at all of the recent rise,
but misled the people Of the Ohio valley
by totally false predictions. Samples OF
these were it's bulletins predicting
fair weather Tor Friday, Saturday and
Sunday, when it rained and showed
every one of those days, and predicting
rain or snow for yesterday when it was
the fairest day we have had since
Thursday Likewise the alleged wea-
ther sharp at Parkersburg gave abso-
lutely no warning of the disastrous
flood that has wrought such havoc and
loss in that city and below, but on the
contrary, when he sent out word of a
two-foot rise, ten foot rise was an
actual and accomplished fact
The most important function of the
weather bureau is to warn people of
impending disaster by storm and flood
and for this purpose it has agents at
every point throughout the United
States, and maintains a costly and
elaborate system and signal service.
Yet the only warning the people of the
Ohio valley had of the recent flood was
through the exertions of the press and
its alert correspondents. who told of &C
tual conditions at headwaters, which
the weather service, with its elaborate
and scientific paraphernalia, ought to
have foretold to certainty at least
ten hours before. The absence of this
warning caused the loss of millions of
dollars worth of property at various
points in the valley, beginning with
Pittsburg, which knew practically moth
ing of the probable extent of the food
until the rising waters were upon it,
AM 1t was too late to save property.
The veriest tyro of young newspa-
per reporter could and did do better
service in warning the people of their
danger in this instance than the great
national weather bureau. What Prof.
Devoe accurately predicted as long ago
as last year, the officials whose duty
and profession it is to keep track of
weather conditions could not foretell
half day ahead, while the predictions
they made were absurdly false.
In short, the weather bureau has fail
ed us so lamentably in the very time
of our greatest need as to demonstrate
that radical overhauling of that SER
vice is in order. Matters could not be
worse, and indeed, might be improved,
. II the head of the bureau were dis
charged and an intelligent ofice-boy
put in his place In the present instance
1t proved worse than useless, mislead-
ing into fancied security those it should
have warned Of impending disaster.
The decision of the appraisers in the