A jet rising from Atlanta and fleeing toward Washington DC flies overhead and takes twelve seconds to cross the branches of a Yellow Pine. It flies into a cloud which at the same height but moving south crosses the branches in forty-nine seconds. The cloud is moving at about one fourth of the jet's speed.
I am 200 plus miles from the DC airports so jets are not climbing or gaining speed when they pass my Wytheville apartment. Jets move at 500 to 600 mph as they cross my sky. Mid sky clouds are moving south, southeast at 150 to 160 mph. That's very fast for a weather front. There are no ground winds now but there are sure going to be soon.
I imagine this high moisture warm air is rushing toward a partial vacuum somewhere over Bermuda. Snow for Spain and France in two days. High winds for southern Virginia.
The five inches of snow that fell on Sunday night melted away this afternoon, and the neighborhood boys have mined the last parking lot piles for snowball ammunition. The wind is forty mph now and sixty degrees feels like thirty. It was so much warmer this morning.
I am 200 plus miles from the DC airports so jets are not climbing or gaining speed when they pass my Wytheville apartment. Jets move at 500 to 600 mph as they cross my sky. Mid sky clouds are moving south, southeast at 150 to 160 mph. That's very fast for a weather front. There are no ground winds now but there are sure going to be soon.
I imagine this high moisture warm air is rushing toward a partial vacuum somewhere over Bermuda. Snow for Spain and France in two days. High winds for southern Virginia.
The five inches of snow that fell on Sunday night melted away this afternoon, and the neighborhood boys have mined the last parking lot piles for snowball ammunition. The wind is forty mph now and sixty degrees feels like thirty. It was so much warmer this morning.
