[1]

From national parks to meat and poultry inspectors to bans on federal loans, the government shutdown of 2013 affected countless facets of life for all Americans. Although the shutdown had little impact on the National Weather Service, as its services were deemed necessary to protect property and life, the impacts of the government shutdown were clearly felt as m e m b e r s o f t h e m e t e o ro l o g i c a l community visited the NOAA website and many of its associated products and found themselves face-to-face with the simple, but blunt screen stating “due to the Federal government shutdown, NOAA.gov and most associated web sites are unavailable. Only web sites necessary to protect lives

continued on page 2

ITHACATIONFall 2013 Volume 14, Issue 1

Stymied, Sequestered, and

Shut Down: The Effects of the

Shutdown on NOAABy Gaige Kerr ’15

CCAMS Happenings, Fall 2013By Zach Zambreski ’14

The 2013-2014 academic year for CCAMS got off to a fantastic start! We welcomed six new freshmen to the club, and as a fun icebreaker trip, the club took a trip to Buttermilk Falls State Park and hiked the scenic trails while getting to know fellow club members. Our club treasurer acquired over seven hundred dollars in funding from SAFC, which will be used for new science demonstrations for education and outreach as well as other accessories for the club, such as club banners and a new weather phone. In addition, this will be the first time an issue of Ithacation is distributed campus-wide, which will help increase our visibility

continued on page 10

CCAMS hikes Buttermilk Falls.

[2]

NOAA shutdown, continued from page 1:and property will be maintained.”

Speculations were made about how tropical weather or additional flooding in Colorado would stymie a vulnerable NOAA, which was already operating at only 45% of its normal efficiency; however, these worries never panned out. A more long term worry was noted by a senior science writer for climatecentral.org, Andrew Freeman. Freeman writes in his October 18 blog that NOAA will be working with fervor to “make up for lost time on a prominent climate report that will help form the basis for the next round of U.N. climate talks.”1 NOAA has combated worries about this important climate report by affirming that it is still on schedule despite lost time at the beginning of October.

Another issue to plague NOAA and its affiliates during the shutdown was the lack of funds to propel research forward on the Antarctic continent during its short summer research season. During this time, the flow of scientists and equipment to Antarctica was halted, leaving the United States’ three research communities at “caretaker status.” The effects of this year’s shutdown has potentially caused “a gap in the lengthy, continuous dataset that scientists have painstakingly collected during the past several decades, whether it is data on [...] ice cores that provide clues to Antarctica's climate history. The president of the National Academy of Sciences, Ralph Cicerone, calls this lack of Antarctic research embarrassing and worrisome: “A lot of major countries and developing countries, too, have a hand in doing research

now in Antarctica. This coming year, the United States is going to be missing. It’s never happened before.”

INSIDE ITHACATION

NOAA Shutdown EffectsBy Gaige KerrPage 1

Interview: Dan WilksBy Joseph LeePage 3

CCAMS Happenings Fall 2013By Zach ZambreskiPage 1

Science in the CloudsBy Molly SmithPage 8

Search and ResearchBy Colin RaymondPage 7

Lions, Tigers, and PYTHON (s)By Zach ZambreskiPage 9

The Dethroning of the MonarchsBy Roop SinghPage 6

All clip art images used in this issue obtained from Microsoft Office.

Hurricane Sandy: One Year LaterBy Zack LabePage 11

CCAMS Does Ag DayBy Tom ScanlonPage 12

Meet the New CCAMS MembersBy Molly SmithPage 15

Ithacation edited by Molly Smith

CCAMS Leaders Field GuideBy Molly SmithPage 16

1 All quotations taken from climatecentral.org, an online community committed to bridging the scientific community with the public on important information and decisions about climate and climate change.

!

Many NOAA websites were unavailable during the shutdown, instead displaying this screen.

It Happened Twenty Years AgoBy Reggie JohnsonPage 12

RiddlesBy Colin RaymondPage 13

[3]

Interview: Professor Dan Wilks

Interview by Joseph Lee ‘13

I had a long-awaited interview with Professor Wilks on 2 May 2013. I did it for CCAMS and I hope you will enjoy reading it. I have not quoted Professor Wilks in the following, but rather paraphrased what he said based on my notes.

What is your inspiration for studying statistics?

In weather forecasting, forecasters always face uncertainty, and statistics is a good way to quantify uncertainty. Therefore, probabilistic forecasting can lead to better decision making. It is ideal to completely know your clients, but in reality a forecast made by the National Weather Service serves a lot of people and they cannot know everyone’s decision making processes.

Did you know that you were going to study statistics before you applied to graduate school?

No I did not. After I accepted my offer from graduate school, I found Allan Murphy’s work interesting and I decided to do research in atmospheric statistics.

What made you leave the West Coast? Why did you choose Cornell (Ithaca)? (Professor Wilks was originally from L.A.)

It is hard to find jobs in such a small field and Cornell had a good job offer for me.

Really? Would you like to live in L.A.? Do you like the cold here?

L.A. would be a good place to live if it only had 5 hundred thousand people, but now it has 5 million. It is not hard to get used to the cold. You are from Hong Kong, right?

You keep a remarkably low profile for someone who is so well-regarded in the field; Why? What is it like being so well known?

I don’t understand your question, “well-known” and “low-profile” are contradicting… I always received emails from reviewers and other people from other countries to look over their papers. I would always try to answer them. I would use an idiom to describe this: Big fish in a small pond.

Prof. Wilks and Joseph Lee on the last day of EAS 6660. Photo provided by Joseph Lee.

continued on page 4

[4]

Wilks Interview, continued from page 3:

What do you think of the current debate over climate change? Where do you think both sides are right and wrong?

Climate change is obviously happening. It is wrong to ignore it. It is due to human activity while anthropogenic climate change has no prospect to stop. I don’t think people will change their lifestyles at all. For the people who are against climate change, most of them have a political agenda; the climatologists provide us with information about the possible consequences and the best way to adapt to climate change.

Why do you like Canandaigua so much (all those problem sets using Canandaigua data)?

I like the name; the way it sounds.

What? Then why do you choose Ithaca? Do you like the way it sounds also?

Well, we live here.

Tell us about the time when you flipped a coin and it landed on its side.

I did it when I was a graduate student. It was an assignment from a statistics class. I flipped coins for many (over 100) times and finally there was one coin that landed on its side. I flipped more than 1 coin at a time, “parallel processing”.

Are you a bassist in a band? What kind of music do you play? Do you have any public performances?

Yes I am a bassist. I play Jazz and I like Jazz. I just played in Big Red Barn last Sunday and I am going to perform on Friday (Slope Day) evening.

What do you do for fun (besides flipping coins and running t-tests)?

(smiling) Well flipping coins and running t-tests are not that much fun. I play music. I have vegetable gardens in my yard. I like to walk my (two) dogs in the woods.

What do you want to do / Where do you want to go when you retire?

I have not decided yet. I will probably continue to do some research. I will definitely keep updating my book.

How did the 70s treat you?

(shocked) I was a student in the 70s. I don’t know.

Why EAS 666? Are you superstitious?

I picked the number because people used to make jokes about statistics being black magic. However, statistics makes perfect sense.

continued on page 5

[5]

Wilks Interview, continued from page 4:

By saying “people”, do you mean dynamicists like Professor Colucci? Well, when he crosses out terms in class he always says “Professor Wilks would not agree on this…”

Yes.

What are the odds of you getting rid of the moustache in the next 5 years?

I had the moustache since 1969.

(stunned) ... How old were you?!

I was 17. I had a beard at that time too. I got rid of it in the 70s.

All right. Thanks a lot! Did you have fun (being interviewed)?

Yes.

I have to thank Professor Wilks for his time. I also have to thank Jase Bernhardt, Johnathan Kirk, Gaige Kerr, Ted McHardy, Seth Saslo, Roop Singh and Zach Zambreski for brainstorming questions for this

interview.

Taughannock Falls after a heavy rain. Photo by Molly Smith.

[6]

This summer I lived on Manhattan’s Upper West Side with 20 other college students from all over the country. All aspiring earth scientists, we were brought together by an internship program at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO). If free housing in Manhattan wasn’t enough, we were given access to LDEO’s world-class research laboratories and worked under leading scientists in climate, geology, and environmental sciences.

I worked with the West Climate team under Dr. Richard Seager whose main focus in the past has been drought in the southwestern United States. However, his team was shifting its focus to climate impacts in the western United States, which is how I ended up working with Monarch butterflies. Our original curiosity was about the steady decline of the Monarch population in their overwintering sites in the oyamel fir forests of Michoacán Mexico. Monarchs transit a large swath of area between central Mexico and southern Canada, twice yearly. This migration, an endangered phenomenon, causes the Monarchs to experience a variety of weather regimes, and systems. I spent a majority of time correlating various weather variables such as wind speed and direction, and precipitation with Monarch populations in various steps of their migration. Eventually I created a multiple linear

regression model of Monarch population and at the culmination of 10 weeks presented my research in a short presentation and poster session.

Monarch butterflies aren’t the only things I learned about this summer. I had the unique opportunity of attending weekly lectures from Lamont scientists about topics that ranged from the exploration of the planet Mercury to the Montreal Protocol. I also attended the weekly meetings of the West Climate team which gave me insight into what its like to be a graduate student. Everyone on the team presented his or her work followed by a discussion of the results and methods to make sure they were sound and all avenues had been explored. It was truly a learning environment.

I even had the opportunity to present my findings to a NOAA representative whose job is to take research findings and bring them to policy and decision makers who would eventually apply the research findings. This connection to the real world is really what draws me to science. I can definitively say that my exposure to all of the facets of research and especially the people that I met made this experience an invaluable one.

Roop Singh presenting a poster on her summer research.Photo provided by Roop Singh.

The Dethroning of the Monarchs:

Interning at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty

Earth ObservatoryBy Roop Singh ’14

[7]

There comes a point in every Cornell student’s life when they must leave the friendly confines of the “Tower of Terror” and test-drive their skills and interests in the outside world. For me, that point came this past summer, working at GFDL (the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory) in Princeton. Coming into it, I wasn’t sure what to expect, since this was my first experience doing atmospheric-science work for something other than a course — where everything’s prescribed and someone, somewhere, already knows the answer. It’s not easy, but it’s comfortable.

In contrast, research is slow and uncertain; I felt like an archeologist, with a staked-out plot and some hand tools, except that the digging was through data, looking for the slightest meaningful statistical result. It helped that the expectations were fairly low: my mentor (Yi Ming) reminded me a number of times how difficult it is to come up with truly novel and important results, and that most work in any scientific field is just permutating other, previous work to flesh out details and nuances of larger theories.

Still, it surprised me how imposing those details and nuances to be fleshed out seem when looked at from below (i.e. when you’re the one tasked with determining them!). My project revolved around, in

brief, writing IDL scripts to calculate changes in extreme precipitation under several different climate-change scenarios, running statistical analyses of the output, and then doing a literature review to try to put together a theoretical framework to explain the results. Being at that time right at the juncture where intra-field specialization becomes necessary (read: planning to apply to grad schools), I chose the topic to search the robustness of my interest in dynamics and modeling.

I ended up getting some intriguing results, to be presented at the AMS Conference in February, but on the whole found that the work didn’t really suit me. There were two reasons for that: dynamics doesn’t interest me like I thought it might, and I felt cloistered due to the solitary, programming-heavy nature of the research as well as the lab’s suburban setting. On the other hand, I got exposure to some of the top dynamicists in the country, and so by extension to some important new theories that are still in development.

My summer working in dynamics gave me a clearer practical idea of how modern science is done, if not confirmation of my a priori interests. It wasn’t always comfortable, but, looking back at it as an experience of searching in the field and researching in the field, it was successful on both counts.

Search and ResearchBy Colin Raymond ’14

Photo by Roop Singh.

[8]

I think I may have just had the best summer of my life. How so? Well, I got to study atmospheric science from an airplane. I was one of thirty-two participants in NASA's Student Airborne Research Program (SARP), based out of Palmdale, California. During this eight-week program, we were given an in-depth look at what it means to be an airborne scientist.

Almost as soon as we arrived in Palmdale, we began installing instruments onto NASA’s DC-8 aircraft. This was not as easy as it sounds. There were computer arrays, tanks of air, and miles upon miles of plastic tubing that all had to be hauled up a rickety flight of stairs and through the plane door, then wrestled into place and secured to the floor. Tubes had to be run from specially installed ports in the plane’s windows to instruments that would measure the precise concentrations of different gasses in the atmosphere. And then there were the endless bolts and cable ties. The last thing anyone wanted was for some heavy piece of equipment to break off and go crashing through the wall of the plane mid-flight, so we had to be very, very careful about fastening down every last item.

It was worth it, though. We flew five missions over the Los Angeles Basin and the Central Valley, collecting data anywhere from 12,000 feet above the ocean to 1,000 feet over the valley floor. (Bring some Dramamine if you ever plan on jetting a mere thousand feet over a flat valley floor in the summer. I swear we spent the whole time bouncing from one convective plume to the

next. But it was still awesome.) We even got to collect some data while flying through one of California’s ubiquitous summer wildfire plumes. When all the missions were flown, they had us take the equipment back off the plane, but that proved to be much easier than bringing it on.

The remainder of the time was spent performing individual research projects on the data we had collected. My research was on variation in the observed ratio of carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide concentrations across the Los Angeles Basin, and the potential that this ratio might have as an indicator of air quality and pollution levels in urban areas. At the very end of the program, we presented this research in front of the other students and a fair number of people from NASA who had a hand in the program.

The eight weeks I spent with SARP were among the most fun I've had in my life, and I definitely recommend this program to anyone interested in field research. They are currently accepting applications for the summer of 2014, available online at:

http://www.nserc.und.edu/sarp/sarp-2014

Molly Smith next to the control panel for the ARCTAS instrument, which measures CO2 concentration.

Photo provided by Molly Smith.

Science in the Clouds: My Internship with NASA’s Student Airborne Research

ProgramBy Molly Smith ’14

[9]

I spent the past summer in Ithaca working for Professor DeGaetano modifying a program that was created by another former student, Ethan Peck. This program attempts to match current nor’easter GFS model storms to historical Nor’easters, based on such conditions as pressure differences and the tracks of the particular storms. The goal is to better forecast surge and tide changes during the current Nor’easter if we have a better idea of what happened in previous similar Nor’easters. Some of the matches were not good fits, so Professor DeGaetano wanted me to come up with a better ranking scheme to fix these poor matches. All of the code I worked on was written either in python or for GrADS.

Aside from the introductory programming class offered by the atmospheric science department, I did not have much background with python or generally any programming language. I was extremely intimidated when I first started working because the original programs were written by a computer science major. However, by the end of the summer, I felt comfortable using and interpreting code written in python or GrADS under the guidance of Professor DeGaetano. He was very patient given my skill set and worked with me everyday to find solutions to the problems I encountered. We ended up creating an

additional ranking scheme to account for the spacing between each storm position, attempting to account for speed differences between the current Nor’easter GFS track and the historical Nor’easter it is trying to match with.

My summer job search began over winter break when I asked different professors about their summer availability because I knew I wanted to stay in Ithaca (I’m not much of a traveler). Most will try to find some sort of project that a student can work on. Other benefits for staying in Ithaca during the summer is the gorgeous weather, which makes gorge swimming much more bearable than during the fall or spring. As an extension of the work I did over the summer, I am doing a research honors thesis looking at storms similar to “Superstorm” Sandy using the same programs I worked with over the summer, modifying them to look at a wider range of storm types (including Nor’easters). I did not go into this job expecting to come out with a thesis topic, which I consider the best benefit that this summer research job provided me as a student looking to go to graduate school. I highly recommend working under a professor in the department during the summer if you do not have a set internship somewhere else. You will not regret it.

Lions, and tigers, and PYTHON (s), Oh My!By Zach Zambreski ’14

North view from Bradfield. Photo by Roop Singh.

[10]

CCAMS Happenings, continued from page 1

amongst the Cornell student population!Our first professional event for the club was a

presentation from an alumnus, Justin Cox. He spoke about his experiences in the wind energy field, which emphasized the diversity of career paths Cornell students in the department take after graduation and the need for people in these exciting, emerging fields.

In September, CCAMS stormed the quad for the annual campus AG day. Several of our members participated during this event, helping raise money for our annual snowfall contest. We also promoted the Cornell Weather Facebook and Twitter pages by handing out QR cards. Weather Woman made a surprise appearance and used her allure to coax unsuspecting students to our table. In addition, one of our members created a trivia contest for AG day visitors to learn about how weather and agriculture during the fall season relate to one another. This event was a huge success for the club.

Forecasting continues to remain a huge focus for club members. We have several new forecasters for our Facebook and Twitter pages, which are updated daily with current information about Ithaca weather. Two returning members and one new member are a part of the ICTV team at Ithaca College, enhancing their

broadcasting skills to prepare them for the media world. Five of our members are representing Cornell in the national WX Challenge, and five members will potentially be presenting their research at the annual AMS conference in February.

During the month of October, we had our first professor-student dinner in Bradfield, which was a successful social and academic gathering filled with delicious fall-themed food. Professor Wysocki had many stories to share for the freshmen, while they technologically enlightened him about the usage of Snapchat. CCAMS also had its first intramural volleyball game. Although it was a loss for the team, members had an enjoyable time. The second game was a close match, only losing by a couple of points. The future of the team looks very bright as we prepare for our next game.

Ideas that are currently in the development stage include a snowman-building contest and the recording of a video for the EAS website, which will help attract prospective students by highlighting the research members do on campus. All of our members and chair positions have been working diligently to make this semester productive, and it is clear that the rest of the year will be filled with many more awesome events!

2013-2014 CCAMS members. Photo provided by Gaige Kerr.

[11]

Hurricane Sandy: One Year LaterBy Zachary Labe ’15

It has now been over one year since Hurricane Sandy paved its path of destruction across the Northeast. Ranked as the second costliest hurricane in United States history, recovery efforts continue across much of the eastern seaboard. Sandy was a tropical system with unique characteristics that many agreed led to damage to even surpass the typical media hype. Tropical storm force winds extended over 1000 miles as it came onshore while heavy snow in parts of the Appalachians exceeded three feet in some of the higher elevations. A new energy index developed by NOAA focusing on the intensity of waves and storm surge ranks Hurricane Sandy at 5.8, surpassing that of even Hurricane Katrina. In the end, the one-in-seven hundred-year storm caused an estimated capital loss of $75 billion.

One year later and many people are still awaiting any monetary government relief for damages. Congress finally passed a $60 billion recovery package, but given the great bureaucratic leaps to file damage claims, many residents in New Jersey and New York continue to remain homeless. A recent ABC News report focused in on significant criticism of the New Jersey governor Chris Christie. One New Jersey resident who lost her home to Sandy’s storm surge remarked, "I hear all these Jersey 'Stronger than the Storm' commercials and it really pisses me off, it's insulting. Christie will spend $20 million on a Sandy commercial and here I am waiting. I can't get any help.” Other business and homeowners also face a similar scenario; The New Jersey Department of Community Affairs is reporting that over 7000 people are awaiting their approval, if at

all, for state grant money to rebuild and repair their communities. A recent storm relief study by Rutgers University reports that it may take upwards of another additional $28 billion in the state of New Jersey to help put it back on its feet. But given the complicated grant application process and slow recovery efforts, many communities will never see these funds. Instead, the cost of Sandy will likely once again by footed by taxpayers. Mayor Dina Long of Sea Bright, NJ, like many others, continues to see slow progress in her damaged community, “Because I applied for this grant, I’ve been unable to do any work on my home in the last six months, my rental assistance from FEMA is over and I am no closer to having an answer on my house than I was in November 2012,” Long said. “So I’m ready to give up. And if I’m ready to give up, I can only imagine what the residents are going through.”

There are still significant improvements that need to be made to natural disaster recovery and relief efforts. Criticism remains high in this area for Hurricane Sandy and other fall-outs such as Hurricane Katrina. Increasing awareness of the dangerous of such tropical system to the general public and higher accuracy meteorological forecasts will only help such much given a storm of Sandy’s magnitude. FEMA and other public/private organizations need to focus on reforming their policies to improve storm recovery efforts for the average citizen. But unfortunately, this process is likely easier said than done as Congressional budget cuts continue to affect FEMA and the National Weather Service.

[12]

For the northeast US, the winter of 1993-1994 was arguably the most prominent winter of the satellite era.

This cold ENSO winter featured biting cold, heavy snow, and for some, the added benefit of freezing rain.

Quoting from the Baltimore Sun article Scorecard on the Winter of '93-'94 (March 20, 1994): "Of the 17 storms that have struck Baltimore since Dec. 21... 12 produced at least three of the four types of precipitation. Four storms produced all four. By comparison, there were only five ice storms in the three previous winters combined.

“On Jan. 17, BWI recorded nine hours of freezing rain, with a surface temperature of only 18 degrees.

“Jan. 25 began four straight days with a mixture of freezing rain, sleet and snow at BWI.

“Feb. 10-11, an extraordinary 4 inches of sleet fell at BWI. On the 11th, the precipitation type changed 10 times.”

For some this was a ice winter, but for others, it was an snow winter. The contrast between snow and ice was remarkable. Philadelphia, PA received 23 inches of snow that winter. But Allentown, only 46 miles north recorded a record 80 inches of snow.

continued on page 14

And It Happened Twenty Years Ago

By Reginald Johnson ’15

CCAMS Does Ag DayTom Scanlon ’15

Roop Singh, Zach Zambreski, and Weather Woman table for CCAMS at Ag Day.

Photo provided by Roop Singh.

Friday, September 20th was a day dominated by clear skies and, as an article quoted our own Zach Zambreski earlier that week, “climatologically above average” temperatures. This day also happened to be the 2013 Agriculture Day, which CCAMS took part in for the first time in recent memory. At our station, an assortment of weather themed attractions could be found. To help explain weather’s role in agriculture, we presented people with an interactive “true or false” game on weather’s effects on the farming. We also displayed a forecast for the then upcoming Homecoming Weekend. And of course, the day featured regular appearances of Weather Woman (Molly Smith) to help attract the masses. In the end, it was a successful Ag Day: we saw and interacted with a steady stream of students, got the word out there about our Facebook and Twitter accounts, and raised almost $30 through the first few entries into our annual Snowfall Contest.

[13]

RiddlesBy Colin Raymond ’14

You’ve seen me before,Yet I am a mystery;I am usually up-to-date,But I always write history.Many people try to guessThe secrets that I hold;Though they fail many times,The truth they’re always told.I live a life of servitude,With data as my only yields;And it gets lonely way out hereStuck amidst the level fields.

Try your hand at some “what am I?” brainteasers with an atmospheric-science theme! Two of these are meteorological phenomena, and the others are things specific to Cornell/our major. Answers will be posted on the CCAMS website by December 3rd.

I guard a place you’ve often been --Have been, will be, and will again.I am where you see the future,If only for a couple of hours;And if you should ever dare to cross me,There’d be death from the ivory tower.I see you often, the town all the time,And I have time on both my sides.There’s only one side of me you really

know,But on the other it’s two feet wide.

We are a tandem teamEndlessly doing the same old job;Sometimes it’s a quiet life,At others we serve the impatient

mob.We work closely, but never

together,Separated by only a couple of feet;We each run a path that’s our own,And never the twain shall meet.The announcer lady does it badlyWhen she speaks inside our cars;If we had voices, here’s what we’d

say:“Destination: 970 mb.”

I come at unexpected times,And lend the earth a bit of glitter(Though I am not brightly colored);In summer its surface I may litter.I am eternal, for a while,As I rise, and fall, and rise again;As time goes on I get more round,And I can even approach a pound;But as with all things, this must end,And then I strike the windswept

ground.

I am one, but really two;I have two names, but they are

combined;I have two homes, and far apart –And people stay in what they’re

assigned.You could say I have two headsBut in fact they’re really chairs;I have no feet, but if I did there’d be

threeI belong in three different places,

you see.Check my website if you want to

inquireAbout news or the latest faculty hire.I cover the Earth and everything in

it;And up above, well, the sky’s the

limit!

Like Aphrodite, I am born from the waves,

Fathered by a wind that bites;And though my parents moan in

creating meI help to make those Silent Nights.I am a geometer, finicky with

angles —Indeed like Goldilocks I am:I like cold, up to a certain point;Then I shut down, like Uncle Sam.He’s shifty and fast-moving, they say

as a warning,But sometimes he pauses and dallies;And that’s when I lazily and gently

buryThe downwind hills and the

downwind valleys.

[14]

Twenty Years Ago, continued from page 12

This was a wintery winter for the Ithaca area as well. Game Farm Station received 69.7" of snow over the December-February period, well above the average of 44.4" for that time period. On January 21, 1994, the temperature plunged to -24F.

The remarkable cold that winter was caused in part by the lingering effects of Mount Pinatubo's eruption in 1991. The aerosols released by the volcano absorbed some of the sun's radiation which cooled the entire planet for a few years.

Lightning from a supercell in central Nebraska. Photo by Ron Stenz.

An Ithaca sundog. Photo by Tom Scanlon.

[15]

Just Who Are the New CCAMS Members of 2013?

“My name is Cari Gostic and I'm from Wading River, NY. My goal is to become involved in climate change research after I graduate. I enjoy playing basketball and recently joined the women's ultimate frisbee team.”

--Cari Gostic, Class of 2017

“Hi, my name is Jonathan and I’m from Humacao, Puerto Rico. Naturally, I really like tropical weather and hurricanes are probably my favorite meteorological phenomenon. My career goal is to work in broadcasting back in Puerto Rico and then in the government agencies. I’m really looking forward to my next four years in CCAMS and I feel honored to be part of this wonderful community.”

--Jonathan Mendez, Class of 2017

“Hi! My name is Ashley and I am a freshman in Atmospheric Sciences. I am from Rockland, Massachusetts which is about 40 minutes away from Boston and the National Weather Service in Taunton, Ma. I am fascinated by severe weather and hope to one day work at the National Weather Service determining weather watches and warnings. My favorite new weather-related thing I've learned since coming to Cornell is METAR code.”

--Ashley Merzon, Class of 2017

“Hi, my name is Kush Dave. I am an atmospheric science major in CALS and I want to be a climatologist in the future because due to climate change, the weather is about to get really bad. If I can predict these drastic changes, I might make some money. I like to make music and play tennis in my free time.”

--Kush Dave, Class of 2017

“Hi, my name is Tommy Biondi, and I have a strange obsession with severe weather and nor’easters. After my studies I hope to do research on severe weather or work at one of the NWS stations that frequently get this type of weather. On the side, I like to play hockey and video games. I am also part of Cornell’s Rocketry Project team.”

--Tommy Biondi, Class of 2017

[16]

CCAMS Officers

CCAMS Chairs

The Field Guide to CCAMS Leaders

Co-President Roop Singh

Co-President Zach Zambreski

SecretarySocial Media/Apparel

Elisa Raffa

Treasurer Gaige Kerr

ForecastingColin Raymond

Alumni Chair Matt Grieco

Ithacation/Co-Webmaster Molly Smith

Co-WebmasterCarolina Bieri

Education and OutreachAaron Match

Social MediaZack Labe

Intramural SportsTom Scanlon

Activities & Social EventsBonnie Acosta