Evening star., 1938-06-07
STARS, MEN AND ATOMS
Notebook of Science Progress in Field.
Laboratory and Study.
laboratory and St:
BY THOMASR. HENRY.

Seldom has the weather been more
discussed, mostly unfavorably, In this
part of the country than during the past
two or three weeks.
The District of Columbia ordinarily is
hot in late May and early June. All
fires are out and coal bills forgotten
for four or five months. This year fires
had to be relighted and folks spent rest
less evenings in stuffy houses.
It may be another generation before
the Middle Atlantic States have such a
spell of March weather in May again.
according to Weather Bureau scientists.
If anything of the sort ever happened
before their records failed to reveal it.
The Districts weather would have been
normal for the season in Northern New
England.
For most of the rest of the United
States the picture was quite different.
West and by and large, says DR.. j. B.
Kincer, chief of the cnmatology section
of the Weather Bureau, almost ideal
weather for the country as whole for
this time Of year. Perhaps the outstand-
ing feature of this season. Mr.. Kincer
says, is that the great Midwest drought
WAlANAl lldc pCISlStCO WlGklOut uluCll UIGdh
since the early 30s seems to have had its
back broken. There has been plenty OF
rain over the Dakotas and Kansas and
Nebraska. The baked-brick countryside
Is green again. Seasons of drought, of
heavy rainfall, and Of normal rainfall
show persistent tendencies to extend
themselves so, although no predictions
can be made, this should be good crop
year for most of the country.
The reasons for Washington's queer
weather are rather complex. In fact,
meteorologists could not have fathomed
them at all few years ago. but now,
with new techniques of air mass analysis
and upper air observations they are able
to 20 at least part of the way toward an
explanation. Basically this part Of the
country was caught on the edge Of very
deep, dense stagnant high pressure area
with the atmosphere relatively heavy to
distances of miles or more above the
eartrl's surface. Within this area the
air kept going round and round in
clockwise fashion.
Where it started from could not be de-
termined with any certainty, but prob
ably over East Central Canada where 1t
still is cold. It swirled eastward over
the Atlantic off the coasts Of Nova
Scotia and New England and then, con-
tinuing its circular movement at con-
siderable speed, southwestward over the
middle Atlantic section. Then it curved
north again and the circular movement
was repeated. Passing over the ocean
the clockwise moving air absorbed the
temperature Of the water. Ordinarily
this is the air which would have been
blown over New England by winds from
the East. It moved so quickly that it
did not have time to be warmed up by
the land before 1t passed over the Dis
trict of Columbia.
Normally such high would have dis
integrated after day or so. This time
1t was so packed down by the weight Of
air above It and also so blocked by per-
sistent low which was moving slowly
southeastward from the Great Lakes re-
gion that 1t did not have q chance to
break up. Weather forecasters were al
most helpless when it came to predic-
tions. They had no idea of how long
the stagnant high would rest over the
land. AS long as 1t persisted the weather
would stay cold, but it might break up at
any time.
The richest temperate zone plant life
In the world is that Of Eastern Asia.
When the great ice sheets crushed
southward from the Arctic o million
years $50 they e6ecttveay destroyed much