Brad Barton's Blog
WBAP Chief Meteorlogist Brad Barton is the only meteorologist in Dallas/Fort Worth focused only on radio. And we’re proud to have Brad now calling WBAP his “home”! Hear Brad’s forecasts each weekday morning during the “WBAP Morning News”, and anytime of the day or night when severe weather is happening in North Texas.
Brad’s blog will cover all kinds of topics….from future weather trends to anything that might be on Brad’s mind. Check back often!
September 03, 2010
"If Stephan Hawking is right, so is the Discovery Channel eco-terrorist"
Recently, reknowned mathemetician Stephen Hawking wrote: “Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the Universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the Universe going.”
Hawking claims the law of gravity pre-existed creation of the universe. But the existence of gravity cannot be proven without matter today, much less billions of years ago. To contend that gravity alone created the matter that exploded in the 'big bang,' requires a greater leap of faith than to believe that a Supreme Being created both matter and energy. Even today, neither man nor anything existing on earth can create either energy or matter, only change the forms.
If this earth is the result of 'spontaneous creation,' what are the odds of it being 93 million miles from the sun with a yearly variance of only 6%? If we were ten percent closer, we would likely be too hot and dry to survive. Ten percent farther away, we would be freezing almost constantly and probably starving for lack of vegetation.
What are the odds of the earth's rotation losing speed, causing us to spiral into the sun?
What if we weren't tilted 23.5 degrees on our axis to spread heat, cold, vegetation, energy and human survival nearly to the poles?
What if water had never been 'spontaneously created?'
What if there was no soil, sand and carbon to filter that water, or no atmosphere to filter the sun's harmful radiation and, at the same time, move mass quantities of desalinated, purified water thousands of miles away from the oceans by air?
If Stephen Hawking is right, and there is no God, we 'filthy humans' really are simply parasites, riding and contaminating this accidental rock hurtling through space for no reason other than reproducing ourselves to the point of our own extinction.
Without God, there is no higher purpose for anything, not even the plants and animals that seem to be so much more precious to environmentalists than humans.
Without God, there is no natural right to 'Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.
posted by Brad Barton at 9:36pm | link
September 01, 2010
"September, Finally!"
Understanding that many people come here for the warmth and hate to say 'so long' to summer, but I'm glad to leave August behind. What a brutal month it was.
Here are the numbers: (preliminary)
Average High....100.5 Tied for 7th warmest.
Average Temp....89.8 Tied for 5th warmest
Average Low......79.0 All-time warmest, beating 2006 by .2 degrees.
Rainfall................ .41 Out of the Top Ten
Our change from moist and mild weather last fall and winter to hot and dry this past summer is due to the end of the El Nino (warm waters) and the start of a new La Nina (cooler water) in the Pacific. Ocean currents and surface winds interact with each other to change global weather patterns. And the current global weather pattern will tend to cause continental storm systems to bypass Texas and much of the southern half of the country this fall. We're expecting warmer and drier-than-normal conditions generally through at least September. Even so, we can also look forward to an average 8-degree-drop in high temperatures over the coming month and we hope, a few opportune rains.
- - Chief Meteorologist Brad Barton
posted by Brad Barton at 5:42am | link
August 30, 2010
"Farmers Almanac: Forecasting or Folklore?"
I enjoy receiving the Farmer's Almanac each fall, but let's get real about the weather, please. Unless you still believe that intentionally bleeding will cure your stomachache or x-raying your feet will help you find your proper shoe-size, getting your weather forecasts from the Farmer's Almanac is hopelessly out of date. To their credit, the forecasters at the Almanac recognized how long-term trends, even decades-long cycles of sunspots and other astronomical factors affected our weather, but science and technology surpassed their primitive methods many years ago.
These are just three of the methods still promoted by the Farmer's Almanac:
The shape of persimmon seeds;
the shape and thickness of pig spleens;
the color of the wishbone of a wild goose.
Just check out the monthly climate summaries from the National Weather Service and compare them to last year's Almanac. You'll see what I mean.
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/fwd/?n=dfwclimo
I still enjoy the articles, features, recipes and folklore of the Farmer's Almanac, and it's a great value. But please, please get your weather from a credible source. I happen to know of a few....
- - Chief Meteorologist Brad Barton
posted by Brad Barton at 8:48am | link
August 26, 2010
"August Weather Records"
Not only have we finally broken the back of our August heat wave, but since this is Texas weather, we did it in style.
After tying high-temperature-records on August 22 (105) and August 23 (107), the cold front came through on the 24th with a high of 97 degrees. The next day, August 25th, our high at DFW topped out at only 81 degrees, setting a new record for a cool high temperature. |
It's not unusual for Texas to end a drought with a flood or a heat-wave with a cold-snap, but it's rare even in Texas to swing between two opposite records within just 48 hours; a record 107 degrees on Monday and a record cool high temperature on Wednesday. The last time that happened was 12 years ago..also in August.
Right now, 2010 is on track to be a top-ten year in terms of high temperatures and it could be #1 for the warmest average overnight lows.
I'll have the final numbers for August next week.
- - Chief Meteorologist Brad Barton
posted by Brad Barton at 7:20am | link
August 22, 2010
"Unsung Heroes from the Freedom Concert"
It's the Sunday morning after last night's Freedom Concert at the Allen Event Center- my first. I can still hear echoes of Charlie Daniels, Michael W. Smith and Lynyrd Skynyrd as they played their hearts out for the cause. The two most moving moments for me were when Lt. Col. Oliver North interviewed some of the Gold Star family members on stage and when we all sang "America the Beautiful" a cappella with Michael W. Smith. The video presentations Sean showcased last night were also moving. I hope we see them again. And who will forget Hal, Brian and Mark jamming with Charlie Daniels during "Devil Went Down to Georgia?"
As I said on my Facebook page, I was awestruck by the inspirational patriotism, love and celebration of America that was on display. And I am unbelievably proud to be a part of the WBAP family who helped make it happen. I was also a little starstruck as I was privileged to shake hands with some of my political heroes, Rep. Sam Johnson, Gov. Rick Perry, Tom Pauken, Brent Bozell and Sean Hannity. WBAP's Promotions Department put much of the event together. Julianna, Victoria, Geoff and so many others, we'll never know how hard you worked to pull it off, but you're the best! I quickly discovered this a year ago when I joined the family. WBAP is not just a radio station, but an institution and not by accident. Thank you to all the talented, principled leaders who've made WBAP not only one of the most successful radio stations in America but one of the best places to work.
Everyone associated with Freedom Alliance Freedom concerts, Sean Hannity, Lt. Col. Oliver North, the stage-acts and WBAP donate all the services they can so that the highest percentage of funds raised can go to the cause; college scholarships for the sons and daughters of American armed forces killed or disabled in the line of duty.
Special thanks to Tom Durant of Classic Chevrolet, the Heritage Foundation and my adopted family at WBAP who co-sponsored the Freedom Concert. And I was proud to see at least two of my sponsors, Clarity Windows and AutoFlex Leasing supporting the event, but....
posted by Brad Barton at 9:19am | link
August 19, 2010
"100-Degree Streak Ends (for 1 day)"
Our streak of 100+ highs ended at 18 days yesterday, Wednesday, August 18 when we failed to reach 100 degrees. A complex of scattered storms that died out north of DFW yesterday morning and reformed southeast of DFW yesterday afternoon. We received very little rain from it here, but the clouds and humidity limited the temperature to 96 degrees. And the humidity also left us with a high heat-stress index near 105 yesterday afternoon.
The main force driving this heat wave is an upper-level high pressure ridge covering the southern third of the country. Occasionally it slides east of Texas, giving us a southwest flow of clouds and moisture. Occasionally it slides west of Texas giving us a light northerly flow aloft, but it's building over North Texas with highs ranging between 101 and 104 today through next Tuesday.
We're hoping a stronger cold front will bring some real change to North Texas by the middle of next week.
- - Chief Meteorologist Brad Barton
posted by Brad Barton at 5:27am | link
August 15, 2010
"Follow-up: Lost Battalion Superheroes"
In the previous blog-entry about the 2nd Battalion, 131st Field Artillery, known as the "Lost Battalion," I wrote of the upcoming reunion and dinner which was Saturday night, Aug. 14. To re-set my connection to it, our daughter-in-law, Holly Gordon Barton is the granddaughter of one of the survivors, Crayton Gordon. He and thousands of other young men spent most of World War II being starved, humiliated, beaten and worked to death in Japanese POW camps throughout Burma and southeast Asia. 'Quaty' Gordon passed away a couple years ago, but it's remarkable how many Lost Battalion survivors from Texas are still on their feet.
Here's a brief history of the battalion from globalsecurity.org:
"The 2nd Battalion, 131st Field Artillery, a National Guard unit from Texas, was dubbed "the Lost Battalion" because their whereabouts were unknown during World War II. On January 11, 1942, 35 days after the outbreak of War with Japan, the Battalion was on Java, the only US ground combat Unit to reach the Netherland East Indies, before the Dutch capitulated to the Japanese. The whole battalion was captured by the Japanese Army on March 8, 1942 on the island of Java. The battalion was called "The Texas Lost Battalion" as they seemed to just disappear for 3 1/2 years. (42 Months). They were prisoners until August 29, 1945. They were sent directly to Japan soon after their capture and then on to Burma to be used as slave labor on the read more
posted by Brad Barton at 9:52am | link
August 10, 2010
"Texas' Lost Battalion of WWII"
Nothing really important in our weather until this weekend, so I'll share a partly-personal word.
"The Greatest Generation" of Tom Brokaw's book is nearly gone. They are our parents and grandparents who survived the Great Depression, won World War II, bound up our enemies and built a new world from the ashes. WWII veterans are disappearing at the rate of 1000 a day worldwide. Some of the greatest of that generation are from North Texas (surprised?) and still kicking, literally. These mostly-North Texas farm boys not only survived and thrived through the depression and the war, but they survived longer than any other Japanese POW's and became the most-decorated Texas military unit of World War II.
The 131st Field Artillery 2nd Battalion were mostly National Guardsmen from Decatur, Bridgeport, Jacksboro, Wichita Falls and surrounds. Most thought they would a serve a year or two and get back their plowing. But they were mobilized and sent overseas to the Phillipines just 2 weeks before Pearl Harbor was attacked.
The battalion was captured on Java when the Japanese overran the Dutch East Indies. Together with captured survivors of the USS Houston, sunk in the Sundra Strait on March 1, 1942, members of the unit came to be known as the Lost Battalion because for a year, no one in the States knew what had happened to them. The men of the Lost Battalion spent the rest of the war, nearly four years in Japanese captivity, working as slaves on the Burma-Siam "Death Railway," memorialized in "Bridge on the River Kwai." While most of the British and Dutch prisoners died in captivity, the core of Texas farm boys survived starvation, abuse, exhaustion and torture on their wits, ingenuity, faith and mental toughness. After nearly four years in captivity, The Lost Battalion was finally liberated in August, 1945 between the atomic bombings of Japan and their formal surrender in Tokyo Bay.
Our daughter-in-law, Holly Gordon Barton is the granddaughter of one of those Texas heroes, Clayton Gordon, who passed into history 2 years ago. But this weekend, the remaining few members of Texas' Lost Battalion will reunite in DFW as free men for the 65th time.
posted by Brad Barton at 7:01am | link
Advertisement
