Breaking a Waterspout with a Gunshot?

While doing a bit of Googling on waterspouts, I came across an article in eHow that made me do a double-take, titled “How to Break a Waterspout with a Gunshot.”

My first response was to wonder whether the writer was referring to an old marine practice that I dimly remember reading about of trying to dissolve waterspouts with cannon fire. But no, the writer doesn’t require that you use a cannon. All you need is a gun, he assures you, preferably one with “the blast strength of a shotgun or better.”

Here’s a link to the article. And since it’s a short piece and I’m leery of broken links, I’m going to also quote it here for you in its entirety.

Instructions

  • Step 1: Assess the strength of the waterspout. Waterspouts are dangerous and require extreme caution, especially if you are going to approach one. You need to assess if getting close to the waterspout is feasible and safe. One good way of assessing the strength of a waterspout is to look at the clouds above it. Regular cumulus parent clouds usually produce weak waterspouts, while supercells produce stronger variants.
  • Step 2: Approach the waterspout. For the sake of breaking the waterspout with a gunshot, the closer you get to the waterspout the better. For the sake of your safety though, distance is preferable. This means that you need to get as close as you can get to the waterspout without jeopardizing your safety or the safety of your vessel and crew.
  • Step 3: Ready your weapon. A gun with the blast strength of a shotgun or better is required to break the waterspout. Most cases of successful use of a gunshot to break a waterspout occurred with a shotgun. So if you have a shotgun on board load it and get ready to fire.
  • Step 4: Fire multiple times. The more times you hit the waterspout the better your chances of breaking it. Your goal is to disturb the atmospheric dynamic that causes and sustains the waterspout with the force of the shotgun blasts. So, the more chaos you add to the waterspout the greater the chances that you can disturb the equilibrium of forces that produce the weather phenomenon.

Hmmm…sounds reasonable. Anyone care to give it a try? Let me know–I’ll lend you my 12 gauge. On second thought, no I won’t. Chances are that’s the last I’d see of it.

I wonder where this person has gotten his or her information, and what actual research–versus anecdotal evidence and pure speculation–is available to back it up? Even the weakest waterspout involves vast scales of motion that extend upward for thousands of feet and aren’t likely to be be impressed by twinky little shotgun pellets passing through them. I’ve seen a video of an airplane flying through a fair-weather waterspout, and the spout didn’t so much as hiccup.

I’m ready to be proved wrong, but I have a hunch that any purported waterspout thwartings by gunshot stem from encounters where the spouts were already at the point of dissolution. Waterspouts aren’t known for their longevity; still, a spout is going to break up when it’s darned good and ready to. Until then, peppering away at it with  “a gun with the blast strength of a shotgun or better” (precisely what “or better” means is unclear to me, but I doubt it matters) isn’t going to make much difference.

I’m no expert on waterspouts, but I do have an opinion on them, namely, that waterspouts are  something to enjoy from a distance, avoid when boating, and respect as a phenomenon over which we have little control.

As for breaking one with a gunshot, gee, why not? But first, let’s you and me go on a snipe hunt. Now, you just stand over there in that swamp, hold this burlap bag open, and call, “Here, snipe-snipe-sniiiiipe!” while I circle around through the woods…

September 7, 2009 by
Filed Under: Nature, Outdoors, Tornadoes, Uncategorized, Weather Tagged With: , , , , ,

Waterspouts in the Lake Michigan Forecast

The marine forecast for Saturday remarked on the possibility of waterspouts on Lake Michigan. Kurt Hulst and I headed to the lakeshore in the hopes of seeing a few spouts, but we wound up disappointed.

We initially targeted Holland, but once we arrived, it became clear that our best shot would be farther north where at least some convection was showing on the radar. So we headed up Lakeshore Drive to Grand Haven and parked in the state park.

In a word, we got skunked. Decent vertical development didn’t begin to show up until it was time to leave, around 4:00 p.m. Kurt needed to be home by 5:00 for a dinner date with his grandmother, so there was no question of sticking around. That was unfortunate, as some formidable-looking cloud bands were finally starting to roll in, and I’m left to wonder whether there were in fact any reports of waterspouts later in the afternoon. As for Kurt and me, we didn’t see a thing, other than some very impressive surf rolling in on a stiff northwest wind.

I’ve never seen a waterspout, and neither has Kurt. Today did nothing to change our unbroken record. Oh, well. Maybe next time.

August 30, 2009 by
Filed Under: Nature, Outdoors, Storm Chasing, Tornadoes, Weather Tagged With: , ,

Finding Jazz in the World Around Us

My sweet lady, Lisa, and I took a trip to Meijer Gardens earlier this week. Today, sifting through the photos I took as our tram ride wound along the curvy path through the world-class outdoor sculpture garden, and afterward as we strolled through the remarkable plantings in the children’s garden, I’m struck–as I often am–at how the elements of music are woven into the very fabric of our world.

Jazz is all around us. Form, space, unity, diversity, rhythm, dynamics, improvisation, color, texture, contrast, creativity–whether in music, nature, speech, literature, art, human relationships, or above all, our relationship with God, you’ll find the same qualities working together to create beauty and interest.

Consider the qualities of space and contrast. In a jazz solo, the notes you don’t play are as important as the ones you do. Too much clutter, too many notes in endless procession, ceases to communicate. As in writing and conversation, well-placed punctuation–held notes, brief pauses, and longer rests–helps to shape musical ideas and gives them breathing room. Yet the furious density of artfully placed double-time passages creates another form of color. Both space and density can be overdone; it’s the contrast between the two that helps raise a solo from the doldrums to vitality.

The massive red iron piece titled “Aria” is a great visual representation of the interrelationship between music and art. The piece has a rhythm to it, shape, space, contrast–all the aspects of a well-crafted jazz improvisation.

Aria: like a jazz solo cast in metal.

Aria: like a jazz solo cast in metal.

Here are a few more images from the sculpture garden and children’s garden that remind me of music and jazz.

What musical elements can you detect? Space? Sequence? Color? Dynamics?

What musical elements can you detect? Space? Sequence? Color? Dynamics?

This landscape sculpture creates unity out of contrast and serenity out of movement.

This landscape sculpture creates unity out of contrast and serenity out of movement.

If only I could play a solo as creative, spontaneous, and cohesive as this!

If only I could play a solo as creative, spontaneous, and cohesive as this!

Lisa: the beautiful song God has brought to my life!

Lisa: the beautiful song God has brought to my life!

August 16, 2009 by
Filed Under: Christian Music, Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Life, Music, Nature, Outdoors, Photography, Saxophone Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

August Lightning

Kurt Hulst and I got together to chase a little lightning last Sunday, August 9.  With dewpoints in the low to mid 70s, temps in the low 90s, and CAPE around 3,000, there was plenty enough gas in the convective tank. Borderline bulk shear and unidirectional winds meant that tornadoes wouldn’t be the order du jour, but it was nice to just get out and watch some storms.

Strong thunderstorm south of Lansing.

Strong thunderstorm near Lansing.

Strangely, even though Kurt and I both knew that it probably didn’t make much difference where we went, north or south–there were a lot of storms to choose from–we had a hard time choosing where we wanted to go. I guess there’s always something that lurks in the back of my head that thinks, I know there won’t be any tornadoes, but just in case, where would one be likeliest to form? It’s dumb, but it’s what goes on in my head and probably what goes on in Kurt’s too, and it tends to needlessly complicate simple choices.

Anyway, we opted to head north and wound up near Saint Johns, where we parked and let a gust front munch us with high winds, spotty but heavy rain, and infrequent lightning.

A lightning bolt strikes outside of Saint Johns, Michigan.

A lightning bolt strikes outside of Saint Johns, Michigan.

Evening colors tinge receding storm clouds.

Evening colors tinge receding storm clouds.

Afterward, we dropped south on I-69 to Charlotte and caught another cell moving in. Kurt got at least one nice lightning shot. I didn’t get anything at that location, but I didn’t mind. The sunset was extraordinarily beautiful, with melon-colored light filtering through wandering rainshafts and turning the sky to a patchwork of clouds, some catching the sunset rays and others concealing them, like a wardrobe filled with glowing garments and gray rags.

Later that night, a second batch of storms blew through Caledonia, and these ones were most sincere. The lightning was nonstop, but the time was late, I was in bed, and I decided to forgo trying to shoot lightning from my balcony and simply lie there and enjoy the show.

August 11, 2009 by
Filed Under: Life, Nature, Outdoors, Photography, Storm Chasing, Weather Tagged With: , , , , , ,

“Will I Ever Become a Good Jazz Improviser?”

What does it take to become proficient at improvising jazz? Will I ever become a decent player?

Have such thoughts ever nagged at you? Perhaps you’re at the stage where you’ve acquired a decent technique, but you’re uncertain how turn it into flowing, musically cohesive improvisations. Will you ever be able to make the leap between mere good chops and great jazz solos?

Or maybe you’ve been playing the sax for a while and you think you’re making strides. Then you come across a YouTube video of some young firebrand who’s blowing circles around anything you ever dreamed of playing, and your heart sags. At that point, you think one of two things: What am I wasting my time for? or I can be that good too if I work at it.

Depression or determination. I’ve felt both emotions at different times. When I was 26 years old, I took a year of music at Wayne State University in Detroit. During my time there, living on campus, I made arrangements to practice after hours in the music building, where I normally woodshedded from 9:00 p.m. to as late as 3:00 in the morning. I worked hard, doing scale exercises, running patterns, and memorizing solos from the famous Charlie Parker Omnibook.

One evening I walked into the building early and heard sounds of music drifting from the auditorium, where one of Detroit’s high school jazz bands was playing a concert. I listened for a bit. They sounded pretty good! But I had work to do, so I broke away and headed for one of the empty classrooms, which I preferred over the smaller practice rooms. Then I assembled my horn and began to work on one of the Omnibook transcriptions I was memorizing.

A few minutes later, several of the high school band members walked into the room. The concert had ended, and they had heard me playing down the hall and decided to get an earful. Cool. I didn’t mind if they hung out and listened. I chatted with them a bit, and then the bass player said, “Hey, we gotta get James.” The other guys agreed that James definitely needed to be gotten, and one of them left to look for him.

I continued to work on my Bird transcription. Pretty soon, in walked a fourteen-year-old kid with a tenor sax tucked under his arm. He listened to me for a minute, then said, “Oh, ‘Ornithology.'” He put his horn to his mouth and started to rip through the Parker solo from memory as flawlessly as if his genetic makeup included an ‘Ornithology’ chromosome. Then, having demonstrated his mastery of a solo that I was only beginning to get my arms around, the kid proceeded to double-tongue a chromatic scale up into his horn’s altissimo register, high enough to sterilize the flies in the room.

I wanted to slap him.

The kid went on to tell me how he planned to master not just the saxophone, but all of the woodwind instruments. Whether he has entirely fulfilled that lofty ambition in the years since, I can’t say, but I do know that today, jazz virtuoso James Carter plays a large number of the woodwind family in addition to the tenor sax.

Fellow saxophonist Tom Stansell, whose family owns and operates the celebrated Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp in Muskegon, where Carter spent a summer as a student years ago, once commented, “No one ever told the kid that it’s hard to play fast.”

As for me, I just kept plugging away at my saxophone. My journey as a musician hasn’t taken me to New York at age 21 or on international tours. Rather, it has placed me in Caledonia playing for cows in the pasture at the west edge of town and taking gigs as they come, which they seem to be doing more and more of lately.

And they should be. Because while I’m no James Carter, I’m a good sax player. I’ve been told on different occasions that I don’t realize how good I really am, and maybe that’s true. I hope so. Coming from capable musicians, compliments like that certainly encourage me, because I’ve worked hard to bring together all the technical stuff–the scales, arpeggios, patterns, solo transcriptions, and everything else I’ve labored at over many years–into something that sounds interesting, original, personal, passionate, and…well, musical.

I hadn’t initially planned to share the above anecdote, but there’s a point to it: discouragement and inspiration often come from the same source, and they’re just a matter of how you look at things. Maybe you’re not playing the way you wish you could play today. But if you stick with it, one day you’ll look back and realize how far you’ve come. The technique that you’re presently unsure what to do with will have become your servant, the building material of ideas which you spin with confidence and ease out of your horn. You may not be the next Michael Brecker–or maybe you will be–but that’s not what it’s about. Do what you do for the love of what you do, and everything else will follow in its time.

Not all of us have the same advantages. Not all of us grew up in musical families or were steeped in jazz at an early age. Not all of us have the same natural aptitude, the same educational opportunities, or the same life circumstances that permit us to practice as much as we’d like. But all of us have the ability to choose whether to persevere or give up. So…

“Will I ever become a good jazz improviser?”

If you quit, the answer is no.

If you keep at it, studying the music, listening to great players, and practicing diligently and consistently, the answer is yes.

Don’t rob yourself of the joy of playing music worth hearing. Don’t deprive the world around you of the pleasure of hearing you. And don’t belittle the talent God gave you, because into that talent is woven a purpose that is higher than you may imagine.

Stay with it. You’ll be glad you did.

August 5, 2009 by
Filed Under: Band, Entertainment, Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Life, Music, Nature, Saxophone, Tornadoes, Weather Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Year of the Cap Bust

I guess I’m just a slow learner when it comes to technical stuff that involves linear thinking. Sooner or later, though, if I stick with something long enough, I usually emerge more knowledgeable for having done so. Nowhere has this been more true than in storm chasing, an activity which obviously depends heavily on figuring out if and where there will be decent storms to chase.

Seems like I’m constantly being confronted with some new aspect of the atmosphere that I haven’t factored into my forecasting, or that I haven’t factored in as effectively as I needed to. The upside of that, though, is that I wouldn’t even be aware of what I don’t know if I hadn’t learned enough to at least recognize my areas of ignorance. If my forecasts aren’t as expert as those of a trained meteorologist, they’re nonetheless a seven-league bound beyond when I was just beginning to grapple with all those arcane terms and acronyms of convective weather such as SBCAPE, CIN, 0-6km bulk shear, LIs, helicity, and lapse rates, and when the only thing I could do with a skew-T or a hodograph was shake my head in bewilderment.

This has been the year of discovering the 700 mb/12C limit. By “discovering,” I mean through empirical experience, and by “empirical experience,” I mean cap busts. Of course, I’ve endured plenty of cap busts in my development as a storm chaser; I just didn’t understand exactly what was going on, or why the high risk area I was sitting in was producing nothing more than smug blue skies rather than carnivorous supercells.

One memorable day in Iowa drove home the lesson perfectly. MLCIN was supposed to erode by later in the afternoon, and it got to a point where it was eroding, at least according the RUC. With SBCAPE at some ridiculous figure like 7,000 j/kg, I figured that at some point a convective tower would punch through the cap and go absolutely gonzo. Instead, the clouds kept firing up into the nicely sheared environment and then dying, firing and dying, firing and dying. The reason? A 700 mb temperature of around 14C, possibly considerably higher. Lesson learned: it doesn’t much matter what the models have to say about the CIN eroding when you’ve got mid-level temperatures like that.

I experienced another cap bust yesterday, though I can’t feel too bad about it since I had no compelling reason to head out in the first place, the conditions were so marginal. It was interesting to notice that in this situation, the circumstances were reversed: RUC showing my area under very breakable 700 mb temps of around 10C, but with MLCIN creating some concern. However, the CIN appeared to be eroding, and when an SPC mesoscale discussion spotlighted the area I was in, I started feeling happy about having made the drive down to west-central Illinois.

But the CIN started building back in, and by 00Z I found myself socked in under values around -300 j/kg. Not much a parcel of air can do with that, I guess, no matter how big the CAPE is. I turned around and headed home.

A paper by Bunker, Wetencamp, and Schild of the NWS in Rapid City, South Dakota, explores the ins and outs of the 700 mb/12C limit and concludes that it has a limited, conditional application. However, as my buddy Mike Kovalchick pointed out to me, the paper also reveals that only 5 percent of tornadoes within the study period formed when H7 temps exceeded 12C, and virtually no violent (EF4 and EF5) tornadoes occurred above that threshold.

So for practical use in storm chasing, the 12C limit appears to be a very useful rule of thumb. The issue for me then becomes a matter of refining my ability to know when cold air advection will lower the 700 mb temps. But that’s a subject for another blog. I’m tired of thinking. It’s time to go meet my buddy Dewey down in Plainwell and grab a brew at Arie’s. Ciao!

August 4, 2009 by
Filed Under: Entertainment, Jazz, Music, Nature, Saxophone, Storm Chasing, Tornadoes, Weather Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Changes Coming to Stormhorn Blog

Greetings, friends and readers of Stormhorn.com!

I want to fill you in on some changes that are in the works for this blog. They’re not here yet, but they are impending, and I anticipate that they will help take the blog, and eventually its parent Stormhorn website, to the next level.

At the moment, the most significant change in the works is a brand-new, custom theme. My lady friend, Lisa, who is absolutely brilliant at website development, online marketing, and all things computer, has been beavering away steadily at the new version. When it is done, this blog will have a new look and much greater versatility. I’m excited about what Lisa has got planned, and I can’t wait to roll it out once it’s ready, see how you like it, and get your feedback.

Concurrent with the new theme, I’ve been thinking about adding an extra element of interest by featuring guest bloggers from time to time. They will be from the worlds of both music and storm chasing. I like the idea of offering you insights and perspectives besides just my own, and I hope that doing so will provide an added value for my readers as well as a positive experience for my contributors.

About my Jazz Improvisation E-BooK: While this project has been on the back burner for a while, I do anticipate picking it back up at some point. I’ve already got several installments written; however,  because I tend to be pretty thorough, each lesson takes me considerable time to develop, and with other more pressing matters to deal with, I just haven’t had time or focus for the e-book. Stay tuned, though, because it is by no means a dead project. As this blog and website continue to develop step by step, I will at some point get the e-book back on track.

So, there you have it: changes are coming to Stormhorn.com, and the first of them is right around the corner. Meanwhile, I’ll continue to post with the existing format, which has served me well thus far. I hope you’ve enjoyed your visits here, and that you’ll enjoy them even more as this blog enters an exciting new phase.

July 28, 2009 by
Filed Under: Band, Entertainment, Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Life, Music, Nature, Saxophone, Storm Chasing, Tornadoes, Uncategorized, Weather Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Cool-Weather Wall Clouds

So there I was, driving down I-96 toward my mother and sister’s house in Grand Rapids this afternoon, when I saw what at first glance looked like a wall cloud. It looked like one at second glance, too, and third, hanging off of a cumulus tower in the distance.

Severe weather wasn’t in the outlook today, and in fact, the afternoon was coolish and not particularly moist, with spotty showers but no thunder or lightning. I was unaware of any reason to be on the lookout for abnormal weather, though the extent of the vertical development in the cumulus clouds coupled with their nicely sheared look would have been a tip-off under more propitious circumstances.

Anyway, I was intrigued by the cloud formation, but not quite prepared to call it anything more than a lowering at that point. It was falling apart over Grand Rapids by the time I turned north onto the East Beltline. But the show was far from over. Another large towering cumulus several miles to my northwest was exhibiting an even larger, blocky lowering which wasn’t showing any signs of dissipating.

That did it. It was time to get close enough to this thing to see just exactly what it was. This was a simple matter. The cloud was drifting quite slowly, and intercepting it involved nothing more elaborate than continuing north up the Beltline past 7 Mile Road, then pulling into a small turn-in, where I had an unobstructed view from maybe half a mile away.

The cloud was indeed a wall cloud. I could see a weak updraft dragging scud up into it, and even a hint of an RFD. More important, the cloud was circulating–very slowly, to be sure, but unmistakably. As it moved closer, I even observed a small, anticyclonic vortex spinning almost directly overhead. There was obviously enough shear and helicity in the atmosphere to create some interest, and I had a nice front-row seat. Just wish I’d had my camera with me, but as I said, I wasn’t expecting anything weatherwise today that would have made me think to grab it.

What I was seeing struck me as more fascinating than threatening, but I decided to call KGRR and report it anyway, just for the record. The met who took my information said he wasn’t surprised. He told me that the office had already received several reports of waterspouts out on Lake Michigan, plus other reports of funnel clouds. Sounded like a cold air funnel outbreak.

My buddy Kurt Hulst called later to tell me that he, too, had seen a wall cloud over Caledonia from where he lives in Kentwood. If I’d been home, it would have been a front door delivery, but of course I wasn’t. Seems to me, though, that Kurt said he got some photos. I hope so, because I’d like to see what I missed.

Days like today just go to show that the weather does what it wants, when it wants. Maybe the local WFO will offer an analysis of today’s conditions. That would be cool.

Lesson learned: take my camera with me wherever I go.

July 19, 2009 by
Filed Under: Band, Entertainment, Jazz, Life, Music, Nature, Outdoors, Saxophone, Storm Chasing, Tornadoes, Weather Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Midweek Severe Weather Potential for the Midwest

A significant weather event appears to be shaping up for the northern plains and cornbelt this coming Tuesday. For all you weather buffs and storm chasers, here are a few maps from the 18Z NAM-WRF run for 7 p.m. CT Tuesday night (technically, 00Z Wednesday), courtesy of F5 Data.

A couple items of note:

* The NAM-WRF is much less aggressive with capping than the GFS.  The dark green 700mb isotherm that stretches diagonally through central Minnesota marks the 6 C contour, and the yellow line to its south is the 8 C isotherm.

* The F5 Data proprietary APRWX Tornado Index shows a bullseye of 50, which is quite high (“Armageddon,” as F5 software creator Andy Revering puts it). The Significant Tornado Parameter is also pretty high, showing a  tiny bullseye of 8 in extreme northwest Iowa by the Missouri River.

Obviously, all this will change from run to run. For now, it’s enough to say that there may be a chase opportunity shaping up for Tuesday.

As for Wednesday, well, we’ll see. The 12Z GFS earlier today showed good CAPE moving into the southern Great Lakes, but the surface winds were from the west, suggesting the usual linear junk we’re so used to. We’ve still got a few days, though, and anything can happen in that time.

SBCAPE in excess of 3,000 j/kg with nicely backed surface winds throughout much of region.

SBCAPE in excess of 3,000 j/kg with nicely backed surface winds throughout much of region.

500mb winds with wind barbs.

500mb winds with wind barbs.

MLCINH (shaded) and 700mb temperatures (contours).

MLCINH (shaded) and 700mb temperatures (contours).

APRWX Tornado Index (shaded) and STP (contours). Note exceedingly high APRWX bullseye.

APRWX Tornado Index (shaded) and STP (contours). Note the exceedingly high APRWX bullseye.

July 11, 2009 by
Filed Under: Nature, Outdoors, Storm Chasing, Tornadoes, Weather Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Harlem.org: Jazz History at the Click of a Mouse

Last week, my lady Lisa sent me a link to a very cool website called harlem.org, which invites viewers to “explore jazz history through one photograph.”

Now, the photo in question, taken by Esquire camera man Art Kane, is one I had seen before, and is in fact quite famous. Featuring a veritable who’s who of jazz history, all gathered together on the steps and sidewalk outside an apartment in Harlem, the picture is utterly remarkable. Count Basie, Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Dizzie Gillespie, Marian McPartland, Milt Hinton, Mary Lou Williams, Thelonius Monk, Sonny Rollins, Maxine Sullivan, Stuff Smith, Oscar Pettiford…all there, along with many others, fifty-seven in all. The patriarchs and the young lions, side by side.

Still more amazing, however, is how harlem.org has utilized this photo to give you quick, biographical insights into everyone who appears in it. Just mouse over the photo to a general area of interest, click, and that section of the photo is enlarged. Now mouse one by one over the musicians in the enlargement and their names appear in a pop-up balloon. And here’s where it gets good: when you click on a particular musician, a larger window pops up containing a photo and information about him or her.

What I’ve described is just a thumbnail sketch of what the site has to offer. If you’re at all interested in the history of jazz, this website is a must. It’s worth visiting just to see the photo alone, but I promise you, you’ll find much more of value besides.

July 10, 2009 by
Filed Under: Band, Entertainment, Jazz, Life, Music, Nature, Photography, Saxophone, Tornadoes Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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