Is anyone interested in Wednesday morning track workouts?  Today we had a mile warm up and a 2 mile cool down with 8-10 200 meter runs at 5K pace with 200 meter jogs in between.  Does that sound like fun?  Are you training for a marathon, next 5K race, triathlon or just trying to stay in shape?

We are coached quite well by Mike Hutchinson from the Sportsspectrum and today there were marathoners, college and high school runners, triathletes and average Joes like myself.  If that sounds like a good time to you, come on out every Wednesday at 6 AM at the Bossier City High School Track and make it happen.  The address is 777 Bearkat Dr. or just take Barksdale Blvd. west from Benton Rd., pass Hamilton Rd. and turn right on Mansfield St. and finally take a left on Bearkat and your there.

It’s a little cooler than any other time of the day too.  This morning, the temp was 73 at the start and we got to see the sun rise!

Joe Haynes

The jetstream is providing for some strange weather across the continental US today.  South of the jet from the desert SW to Montana and SE toward Atlanta is hot under a large high pressure ridge in the upper atmosphere.  North of the jet and under a cold cyclone in the NE US is where the spring-like weather is residing.  Notice that temps range from 106 in Phoenix to 65 in Chicago thanks to the jet!

This weather pattern will shift a little east for the next few days heating the ArkLaTex back up and moderating the cold in the New England states.  Then as the July 4th holiday weekend comes about, the weather pattern shifts back to the west returning New England to the cold, the SW to the heat and the ArkLaTex inbetween with a little chance of rain.

Stay tuned to KTBS 3 for the latest forecast updates.

Joe Haynes

I often read Jeff Master’s blog on the Weather Underground website.  He’s very keen when it comes to hurricanes.. and often has interesting topics on his blog.  With hurricane season quiet for now.. he touched on an interesting topic.. hurricane hunters.  These guys risk their lives during hurricane season - flying into the storms and collecting data that we use on the ground.  They are one of the reasons hurricane forecasting has become so advanced.  With hurricane season staying slow for the next few days.. Jeff took a moment to honor some of the hunters who lost their life for the sake of hurricanes, and our safety.  Take a look:

The tropics are quiet right now, as the “invest 93″ disturbance over the Yucatan Peninsula has dissipated, and no computer models are showing any Atlantic tropical storm formation over the next seven days. Thus, it’s a good time to continue with my series on the six typhoon/hurricane hunter missions that never returned.

The third typhoon hunter mission lost occurred on December 16, 1953, during a penetration by a Navy PB4Y-2S (Bu No 59176) into Typhoon Doris. The aircraft was part of a six plane squadron, VJ-1/VW-3, COMFAIRGUAM, based at the Naval Air Station in Agana, Guam (VJ-1 was formed in 1952 at NAS Sand Point, Seattle, Washington, and the name later changed to VW-3). The PB4Y-2S aircraft made its initial penetration into Doris’ eye at 200 - 300 feet. As the aircraft radioed back a report at 2245Z, the transmission suddenly ceased. The plane was never heard from again. At the time, Doris was a Category 2 typhoon with sustained winds of 95 knots (110 mph). Again, given the low penetration altitude of the aircraft, it is likely that a downdraft carried the plane into the sea. It’s pretty common to get downdrafts that will cause a 300 foot loss of altitude, despite the attempts of the pilot to climb with full power to the engines.

A nine-day long search and rescue operation failed to find any trace of the missing aircraft. Tragically, two aircraft involved in the search and rescue mission crashed, killing 39 more people. The first of these planes was a R4D (DC 3) that crashed into the crater of Agrihan Island, Mariannas, killing all ten crew members. This aircraft was not from the NAS Agana, Guam group. In addition, a B-29 based at Anderson AFB had an engine fail while looking for the missing typhoon hunter aircraft, and crashed during landing into an officer’s housing area on Guam. A total of 29 people died in the crash, including at least 11 of the 16 crew members on the aircraft.

The nine crewmen lost during the flight into Typhoon Doris were:

Pilot J. W. Newhall age 39
Co-pilot S. B. Marsden, age 29
Lt. Cmdr. D. Zimmerman Jr., age 35
Ltjg. F. Troescher Jr., age 26
AL1 F. R. Barnett, age 26
AD1 J. N. Clark, age 32
AD3 E. L. Myer, age 20
AL2 N. J. Stephens, age 23
AO3 A. J. Stott, age 23

I got in contact with Austen Doolittle, who was operating the radio set in Guam when the transmission inside Typhoon Doris from the plane’s radio operator, Norm Stephens, suddenly stopped. Austen recalled:

Jeff, I appreciate receiving your email, Earl Beech and I were at our second reunion in 55 years the 4th to 8th of May at Pensacola FL. Had a great time. Its important to the members of the VJ1/VW3 to make people aware of what we were doing so many years ago as 19 and 20 year old young sailors. I lost three of my best navy friends in that accident, and to this day I still wonder about the happenstance of my being on base radio that day and receiving the POMAR reports from Norm Stephens. There was an ability to recognize the hand or keying of people you knew, and I know that Norm Stephens was keying that last message to me. When he cut off I knew something had happened, and it really shook me up, and I tried to raise the plane many times until I knew it was not possible. I still have many pictures of Norm, Don Stott and Jim Clark in my album. Thanks for what you are doing, I really appreciate it. I’ve had a long and fruitful life since then, but I’ll never forget that day, and still wonder why I was so lucky.

Austen

Figure 1. Painting of a Navy PB4Y-2S “Privateer” aircraft flown by the VJ-1/VW3 Squadron. Image credit: USS Whitehurst DE-634 web site. Several stories by members of the VJ-1/VW3 Squadron concerning the Typhoon Doris disaster are posted on the web site.

Other sources: http://www.vpnavy.com/vj1_notice.html

The first week of Summer was ‘Lightning Safety Awareness Week’, designated by the National Weather Service. Since summer is the deadliest time for lightning strikes, it couldn’t have come at a better time.   So far, for the month of June, 11 people have been killed in the United States due to lightning strikes.  That’s according to CNN, and they have a great article on the dangers of the bolts.  It also has a link to some common myths about lightning.  You can check it out here.

Marcy Novak

A few record high temperatures were set yesterday.  In Shreveport, the temperature reached 102 establishing a new record high for June 27.   The last 102 record reading for June 27 was  recorded way back in 1875.   The National Weather Service in Shreveport has records that date back to 1874.  In northeast Louisiana,  Monroe hit 103 degrees setting a new record high temperature reading for June 27 with the old record set during the Dust Bowl year of 1936 with 101 degrees.    

For Shreveport,  yesterday’s record setting maximum temperature was 10 degrees above normal and occurred at 4:18 PM CDT. For precipitation,  Shreveport’s rain guage indicates 1.22 inches has fallen at the National Weather Service office this month.    This value is 3.36 inches below normal through June 27.

 Another hot one is due for today.  Watch KTBS TV 3  Stormteam for the lastest weather updates and forecasts.

W.   BUTLER