Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1909-03-17
THAT STORM OF
 MARCH THE FOURTH
Willis |. Moore, Chief oi the Weather Bureau at Washington, Explains the Disagreeable Weather on h. auguration Day After Fair Weather Had Been Promised,

Had Been Promised.
 1 -At the request of II. E. Alicatore, section director at Little Rock The Graphic publishes the following ex- planation, offered by Chief Moore. of i Washington, in telling how "it all oc- curred:"
 1t is not usual to ans Wer criticisms oi the forecasts of the weather b1- reau, but the hundreds of press clip pings that have been received since March 1 containing adverse criticisms
 at the bureau seem to call for q
 statement from me.
 Forecasts of the weather bureau , are before the public every day in the year.
 In the past about one prediction out of ten failed to be verified, and it may be expected that the same ra- , to of failure will be maintained un- til meteorology can be made, what il is not now, an exact science. In the case of the storm that visit ed Washington on the lth of March last, the fact is that the disturbance , began here on the morning of the 'rtl and ,was accurately forecast the day before The bureau anticipated that the storm center would pass oyer the / <r1 tt, night Of the 5rd and that north west winds and fall nS temperatures would leave |; clear day for the 4th Tie center was precisely a@ forecast: the
 wind shifted and the temperature fell, but instead of the north"es, wind clearing the sky, as it does in nearly all cases, precipitation in the form of snow occurred and continued for l2 hours after the storm center had past eastward. No forecaste1 could foresee this
 Were We to forecast a fall of snow ters, that move from the northwest We would have hundreds of failures charged against us, instead Of an oc- casional one; for it is rare that snow falls in the middle Atlantic states eX- cept with the approach of storm l from the southeast, which causes thl northeast winds, and it is extremely
 rare that any storm in this resioa 1 that begins with rain ends with snow 1 of any considerable amount, On the contrary. many storms that begin as snow end with rain,
 The forecast in question was made i by one of the most experienced fora- casters of the bureau, and was con i cured in by all of the forecasteI.
 who were conversant with the condi-
 tions, and the same forecast would be made today if similar cOnd. tions existed.
 ! The forecasters oe the United States
 weather bureau are the equals, if not
 the superiors of any others ill t,l' l W NOlAA tiuu llCll pi S0iN lioiIo Ci IIOot :
 cold waves, floods and marine storms although subject to error in the pro
 portion of about one to ten, are ot
 such value to the industries of tht
 nation that if one of the newspapers that now so freely criticize because
 two unverified forecasts for the Dis
 trict of Columbia have fallen on in
 auguration day were to omit from its
 pages the daily predictions ol the
 weather it's readers would compel il
 to restore them, and if the depart
 ment of congress were to close ;
 station of the bureau in any part o
 the United States property interests
 would demand it's restoration. This
 would not be the case if the hya-
 terical abuse that is now ing in
 dulged in was justified.
 l WILLIS L. MOORE, Chief U. s. Weather Bureau l Washington, D. C.. March 10th
 1eoe.