Here in Western New York, wind is anything but uncommon, especially during the spring. Spring is the time of clashing warm and cold airmasses, and it’s this difference that helps drive strong winds into our area. But has it been windier than normal lately? It seems that way to many people. In fact, many are wondering when we’re finally going to get a day that’s NOT windy! So, let’s take a look at the data and see if the winds of change really are changing…
If we take a look at the daily wind readings from the Rochester Airport for the past 30 days, we’ll find that many of our highest wind gusts were at least 30 MPH, some even getting up to or beyond 40 MPH. Now of course, this is subjective, but I like to classify days where the strongest gust is above 20 MPH as “breezy”, and days with strongest gusts above 30 MPH as “windy”. Based off that, 83% of these past 30 days have been at least “breezy”, and HALF have been “windy”. That’s pretty impressive, even for April.
If we look back further, we find even more surprising results. Not only did Rochester have an abnormally windy March, nearly the ENTIRE COUNTRY did as well. the only areas that received near normal wind speeds were the far northern Great Plains, South Texas, and South Florida.
So WHY has it been so windy? During the spring, we have to deal with warm and cold air fighting for dominance. The warm air courtesy of increased sunshine is trying to move in and replace the lingering cold from last winter. Cold air is denser than warm air, and when they meet, they want to equalize. We call this the pressure gradient force, and alongside the Coriolis force (which is caused by Earth’s rotation), it helps create swirling storms of low pressure, where higher pressure is trying to fill in. Wind is simply air moving from areas of high pressure to areas of low pressure. The stronger the difference in pressure, the stronger the winds… And since spring has bigger differences in temperature, these windy systems are more common.
So then the next question is, WHY have these systems been getting so close to us and giving us their strong winds? Storm tracks are influenced by a multitude of factors, most notably the jet stream, which is itself heavily influenced by multiple large-scale movements and climatic processes. These include but are certainly not limited to patterns like the North Atlantic Oscillation or the El Nino/Southern Oscillation. Very simply put, things have been lining up well for these windy systems to frequently pass us close by. Whether this windier-than-normal pattern will continue into May is somewhat unclear, but as we continue to warm up, the battle between the clashing air masses will calm down, which will help to finally give us those “not-windy days” we’ve been waiting for.
First Alert Weather In-Depth: Has it been windier than normal lately? WHEC.com.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( First Alert Weather In-Depth: Has it been windier than normal lately? )
Also on site :