University of Kansas - Jayhawker Yearbook (Lawrence, KS)

Page 30 text:

' When University of Kansas students look back at the winter of 1988-1989, they will remember the week of Jan. 31, during which temperatures in Lawrence dropped 8 1 degrees - from a high of 71 to a low of 9 below zero - in just four days. When weather historians look back at the winter of 1988-1989, they may be tempted to call it The winter of La Nina and the Omega Block. La Nina and the Omega Block are the two most prevalent theories for a winter that began with drier-than-normal condi- tions in December and mild temperatures in both December and January, but which suddenly became arctic on Feb. I, accord- WEIRD WINTER WEATHER by Bill Kempin ing to the KU weather service. December precipitation in Lawrence was 0.8 inches below normal and included no snow, said Ed Levy, observer for the weather service. The December mean temperature of 39.4 degrees was five de- grees warmer than normal. Levy called that temperature variance a significant difference. Even more significant were January ' s temperature readings. The mean January temperature of 43.5 degrees was 15 degrees warmer than normal. Mark Bogner, president of the atmo- spheric science club and a member of the weather service, said the dry conditions that held down precipitation totals throughout 1988 were still in effect at the beginning of the winter, and the drought of ' 88 could be traced back to the equator- ial Pacific Ocean and the theory of La Nina. Meteorologists describe La Nina as a band of cold water near the equator streaching from South America to the central Pacific. It crops up when trade winds from the east blow warm surface water to the western Pacific, prompting colder water in the ocean depths to come to the surface. A band of this cold water and a stretch of warm water southeast of Hawaii clashed, Bogner said, causing a zone of unstable air resulting in thunderstorms. Normally, these thunderstorms form just north of the equator, but in 1988 they formed farther north, on the edge of the jet stream. The jet stream is a long, nar- row high-altitude current of high-speed winds blowing generally from west to east. The storms on the edge of the jet stream caused swirls and eddies in the atmosphere that created high pressure and low pressure systems, pushing the jet stream farther north than usual. This al- lowed a large, dry high-pressure system to set up and hover over the United States, especially the Midwest, resulting in high temperatures and no rain or snow. In effect, La Nina drew moisture away from us, Bogner said, and left us with drier and warmer air. While La Nina is the most plausible explanation for the lack of precipitation and cold air, some have raised another theoretical possibility, the greenhouse effect. Students take advantage of unusually warm weather on Jan. 31, 1989, in front of The Crossing. 26

Page 29 text:

young grey squirrel munches on a nut in Watlcins glen. Koprowski catches the squirrels and marks them for easy identification. C OCOR. tM adtixb I vinter. Almost all of the adult females eproduced in winter 1987-88, Koprowski aid, but only two out of 18 females in the ;rove reproduced in spring or summer :9 88. Koprowski predicted that none of the emales would reproduce in the next mat- ng season because of the hard times they vould have to face in the winter. Koprowski bases his study on those quirrels he has successfully been able to rap and mark. He tries to catch the ' ounger ones during the warmer season. fter trapping them, he inserts an ear tag md shaves certain parts of their bodies. These shaved areas will grow back white. The unpigmented fur is a permanent narking, so once Koprowski catches one, t is not necessary for him to catch it igain. On some of them, I have used a black iir dye, Koprowski said. But once they nolt, it gets kind of difficult to identify :hem. That ' s why I started shaving Jiem. Kenneth Armitage, professor of biolo- gical systems and ecology, said that Ko- Drowski ' s marking method has allowed lim to follow individual squirrels over several generations and discover new facts ibout the tree squirrel ' s social behavior. Armitage is the originator of the mod- si Koprowski is testing. The model is Dased on the social behavior of several different species of squirrels. The aspect Koprowski is testing, the social behavior of tree squirrels, has been disputed over the last few years. Many scientists were under the impression that tree squirrels were hostile and territorial, but Koprowski has uncovered a complex and extremely social behavior among tree squirrels. Koprowski has really learned how the social system of the tree squirrels works. Other people who have tried to find things out about them didn ' t look long enough, they didn ' t mark them and had no way of telling the age or the relation- ship of the squirrels. Armitage also said that Koprowski had had some difficulty with people who didn ' t understand the nature of his re- search. People think I am really inhumane and I am mangling the squirrels, but I care more about them than probably any- one will know, Koprowski said. I am really glad to see that people are con- cerned about the wildlife, but what I do is not bad for the squirrels. Koprowski prides himself on keeping a professional view of his research by dis- tancing himself from the emotional aspect of getting to know the different squirrels and their relationships withing their com- munity, but it ' s not always easy. I sometimes find myself kind of root- ing for the underdog. I try not to name them, but the ones that are king of odd - like the ones without tails - they ' re Stubb One and Stubb Two. One of Koprowski ' s most pressing con- cerns is that people try to help the squir- rels by putting food out for them. That is only a temporary method of solving the problem. It gives them an artificial high. If people constantly feed the squirrels they will tend to rely on the extra food, Koproski said. When that food supply is cut off, more will die than if the situation was left up to mother nature. They have been surviving for millions of years, and by now they are probably pretty good at it, Koprowski said. They don ' t really need much help. Koprowski notes the location and activity of the squirreb in his study. 25

Page 31 text:

tt El to That theory says that earth tempera- I, I ures may be slowly rising because green- I . it iouse gases such as carbon dioxide and ' ' ome pollutants are building up in the tmosphere, trapping heat near the arth ' s surface and aggravating a Irought. Bogner doesn ' t put much stock in that ' ' : i heory explaining the winter ' s conditions. ;:.:. It would have to take effect over hun- : , reds of years, Bogner said. You : j ouldn ' t be able to notice it over a life- ime. Bogner ' s statements are backed up by ; L , ;i mdings from the National Oceanic and Umospheric Administration reporting na tai significant evidence of temperature in- - -, rease in this country between 1895 and : ..j 987. The NOAA study analyzed re- : , : , ords of temperatures and precipitation rom about 6,000 locations for almost a ,..,.: entury and found only expected seasonal ariations. So much for December and January. ut what about the bone-chilling cold air -. HH ----- .5 -..;;, jitj nat abruptly entered the scene in Febru- The culprit responsible for that mur- ... .,, erous cold is an Omega Block that devel- ... ped in Alaska, according to Joe Eagle- , lan, professor of atmospheric sciences ' k ad of that department. Eagleman described the Omega Block .. .. SB a well-developed weather system with rcles of high pressure concentrated round it. The bands of high pressure ike the rounded shape of the Greek let- i omega, hence the name. Air pressure is literally a measure of ie weight of the atmosphere. The air t f as certainly heavy in Northway, Alaska, .. i n Jan. 31, the day before the cold air .ached us. On that Tuesday, the Na- . ( onal Weather Service recorded a baro- , letric reading of 31.85 inches, the high- j t atmospheric pressure ever measured in { le Western Hemisphere. Eagleman said that one of the charac- t teristics of this block of high pressure was its stability. Systems usually respond to heating in the tropics and cooling in the polar areas, he said. Heat is then transferred to the poles, and vice versa. That ' s the reason for winds. Sometimes though, there is less mix- ing for a while, and things stabilize. The stabilizing effect of the Omega Block built the intensity of the cold air, Eagleman said. Another factor was the long arctic nights in Alaska during the winter, resulting in only two or three hours of sunlight each day. The long periods without the sun ' s heat helped to build a pool of dense, frigid air that was the catalyst for Alaska ' s record-setting cold. The clockwise circulation of air around the high pressure system kept building in strength as it picked up more and more cold from the North Pole until it finally overpowered the warm air south of that system and pushed it toward Canada and the continental United States, Eagleman said. Andrew Morrison Taking advantage of the first snow of the year, David Whitaker, Onterville, Ohio, sophomore sleds behind McCollum Hall on Feb. 5. 27