Ticker for November 27, 2012

                
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November 27, 2012  November 27, 2012  November 27, 2012  November 27, 2012


Cold in the Panhandle (but still awesome)

A huge outcry for a Ticker today sent me back to the salt mine (okay, a co-worker
said "will there be a Ticker today?" ... to a guy with my narcissism, that's an
outcry) looking at the cold weather about the state this morning. Certainly no
record breaking cold. It is late November, after all. But we did see temperatures
drop down into the teens in the northern part of the state, including a 12 out in
Beaver.




That reading of 12 degrees is the lowest temperature measured by the Mesonet since
February 12 of this year, believe it or not, when Jay reached a low of 8 degrees
(several other NE OK stations were below 12 degrees as well). By the way, that
12 degrees is tied for the 20th coolest reading of 2012. The lowest it goes is
aforementioned 8 degrees from Jay. Also, there have only been seven days with
lows of at least 12 degrees on the Meosnet in 2012 (counting today).

Yes, it's been a warm year, especially during the cool season. Looks like things
are going to heat back up by the end of the week. Forecast highs will be in the
70s in western OK by Thursday, and the entire state by Saturday. These forecasts
are courtesy of the NWS. And Sunday and Monday are supposed to be even warmer!





The November and early December periods are doing their best to push us to
our warmest year on record. It's looking more and more like we'll bust
through that mark from 1954. We'll have more on that in a couple of days.

It was a refreshing change to talk about temperatures instead of drought for
once! Oh, since you brought drought up, I thought you'd like to see a couple more
pictures that blew our way from the world wide webs. These come from a farm
to the west of Okarche. We appreciate those folks sending these in, and we feel
their pain. Looks a lot like what the Little Pond That Couldn't has gone through
up around Buffalo. At least no weeds in this pond just yet. Easy fishing though.
I understand fish that have rotted like that are big in Sweden.

This pond is about 15 acres and up to 9 feet deep.




That's gross? Please. Don't make me bust those grasshopper pictures out again!

One last tidbit. A reader with more fingers and toes than I have figured up
some interesting ways to get us some rain here in Oklahoma. Anybody have
5,190,571 747s handy? Thanks Matthew!

Area of Oklahoma: 69,898 square miles (or 1,948,644,403,200 square feet)
Volume of Oklahoma (1 inch depth): 162,387,033,600 cubic feet

Volume of an average car: 100 cubic feet
Population of Oklahoma: 3,791,508 people
Volume of water that could be transported if every person in Oklahoma owned a car and brought one carload of water from the ocean to Oklahoma: 379,150,800 cubic feet
How many inches of rain is that spread over the state? 0.0023 inches
Fuel costs? $300,000,000

Volume of a Boeing 747: 31,285 cubic feet
# of 747's needed to bring one inch of rain to Oklahoma: 5,190,571 planes
Fuel costs? $31,000,000,000 (that's 3 times the national debt)

Volume of water rushing over Niagara Falls every second: 64,770 cubic feet
per second

How long would that take to cover Oklahoma in one inch of rain? 29 days
of continual flow

Gary McManus
Associate State Climatologist
Oklahoma Climatological Survey
(405) 325-2253