Greetings to everyone! I hope this week’s post finds you happy, healthy and the weather is to your liking wherever you are around the world. Across North America, the severe weather season continues. If you’d like a detailed review of tornado and severe weather safety, please review posts from March and April. You’ll find a plethora of severe weather, tornado, and flooding safety information. The Atlantic hurricane season officially began on June 1. This week, I will start posting a series of hurricane safety infographics. There are many good science reads to review for this week, so let’s get started.

• As human being are want to do, we are subject to biases, trusting sensationalist rumors over experts, misinformation, and disinformation. Once we acknowledge that fact, the real work begins. “Can we keep human inconsistency from confusing expert advice?“
• The scientific story behind the origins and ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic are complicated. Here’s a look at five different charts that help to put the ongoing pandemic into an objective perspective.
• Here’s some very good astronomy news. NASA will be going back to Venus for the first time in almost thirty years.
• “Prepare for the worst: 10 steps to get ready for wildfire smoke.” People are outdoors more due to ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Since most #wildfires are caused by human activity, the summer of 2021 has the potential to be worse than any season before it.
• A town in Norway is feeling the effects of climate change in a multitude of ways. “The World’s Northernmost Town Is Changing Dramatically.”
• This is certainly an eye opening read. “Here Are America’s Top Methane Emitters. Some Will Surprise You.”
• The threat of climate tipping points going down like a row of dominoes is a very real threat. The effects are substantial and would be long-lasting.
• An ounce of prevention is far less expensive than a pound of cure in many disaster scenarios. “Beleaguered by disaster damages, the USA may finally start spending on resilience.”
• In case you missed it, the annual Atlantic hurricane season outlook has been released by NOAA. A busier than normal tropical cyclone season is predicted. We’ve already had our first named storm for the Atlantic. Current outlooks indicate we could be in for a very busy season.

THE BASICS OF HURRICANE SAFETY

PREPARING A HURRICANE EMERGENCY KIT FOR HOME, VEHICLE, AND WORK

This helpful checklist from the American Red Cross will help you put together an emergency kit. This is essential in a variety of dangerous scenarios from hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding, wildfires, and blizzards.

Where you get your weather forecasts, warnings, and other important information is as important as being informed. Discretion is of the upmost importance when you’re trying to stay weather aware. As of late, it’s been brought to my attention that there have been amateur ‘forecasters’ using graphics with the intention of appearing as professional and official sources of information on Twitter, Facebook, et al. They should NOT be taken as official sources of potentially life-saving warnings and weather forecasts and updates.

Social media is a very useful tool that can be misused for misinformation, disinformation, and hype. While this infographic is geared towards, winter weather, it certainly applies to ALL types of weather year round.

That’s a wrap for this post! As I mentioned in the introduction, if you’d like a detailed review of tornado and severe weather safety, please review the previous posts. Next week, we’ll take a look at more hurricane preparedness. I’d like to extend a big ‘Thank You’ to my followers in social media. I’m glad you’re along for the fun! If you’re on Twitter, Tumblr, or Instagram, let’s connect! As for the COVID-19 pandemic, get vaccinated, sport a spiffy mask, practice good hand-washing hygiene, mind your social distancing, stay safe, and stay healthy!

See you next Saturday!

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