MONTHLY WEATHER REVIEW. NOVEMBER, 19 1 1 1716
uncertainty BB to the amount of this damage that renders it impossible to f i p out the exact 1088.
If we look back to the old records, before the Government estab- W e d the Signal Service or Weather Bureau, we will find that the damage from premature freezes of this kind brought overwhelmin ruin to the cane crop, and that in many years the crop was injure3 three-fourths and more. The planters had nothing to guide them as to the weether, no notice of the coming of a freeze until i t was on them. To-dsy, becauee we know more of the weather, the loas is not likely to be over 15 per cent. It is difficult to ap reciate how much these weather forecnsts mean to the cane growera, g r perhaps no crop is in greater danger from sud- den t e m r t u r e changes than sugar cane. Both of the recent freezes were su den. The wind which carried the cold wave of November 13 to the sugar belt was blowing 40 to 50 miles an hour. It waa impos-
sible, therefore, to predict the freeze more than 40 hours in advance; but these 40 hours given the sugar planters to repare were invaluable and saved Louisiana from millions of dollars of ross. The second freeze
WBB predicted, or rather announced, two days in advance of its arrival, and gave the phntera ample time to get ready for their enemy. These warnin s permitted the mving of the eater part of the crop, and were valuabfe not only for the present but% future years, for they enahled the planters to save the seed cane. But for them we would have had to reduce our cane acreage next year. The country correspondents of the Louisiana Planter furnish mme valuable information on this point. Thus from Iberville we learn that
a majority of the plantera heeded the warnings a t once, and began to windrow the moment the Weather Bureau informed them a cold wave
W ~B on its way here, and they thus eaved their crop. In Assumption a number of planters did not believe the warning, and will lose heavily in consequence of their failure to windrow. Rut the
stro est evidence comes from Lafayette, where the Planter’s corre- s p o z e n t remarks :
“Fortunately the United States Weather Bureau gave timely warn- ing of the coming freeze, and those planters who had standing cane were able to put it in windrows before the cold blast struck. A few, however, were caught, not fully appreciating the warning, and trust- ing to luck that after all Uncle Sam s prediction as to destructive cold a proaching might not come true. I t is, therefore, quite certain that t&re will be mme further loss, not only of standing cane, but of much ex sed in heap rows.” g b a b l next time they will give better heeding to these warnings. The w a d e r reporte have vindicated themselves and roved their value; and with this protection and notice Sroperly utifized by the planters the cane crop will be’better protecte against sudden changes in weather conditions and the cro made more certain. The Weather Bureau in ita predictions, especial? as far aa freezes go, has made great progress in the last few years, an8we may hope for still further im- provement as the science of metereology progresses.
ABNORXALITIEB OF NOVEMBER WEATHER AT BPRINGFIELD, IKO.
By JOHN 8. H m a , Local Forecaster.
Abnormally high barometric pressure frevailed during the first of the month and on Novem er 3 a reduced
temperature changes. The temperature at SpringEeld rose steadily from 2 a. m.
of the 5th to 6 a. m. of the 6th. A com arison of the records of tern erature from Bentonville, l r k ., and Iola and Topeka, Zans., indicates similar conditions over a
considerable area, although the records from outside stations do not show as ronounced a change in tem-
geld On November 11, a pressure, reduced to sea levei, of 29.33 inches occurred, which breaks the record for low pressure durin the month of November. This
about 17 hours. On the l l t h , cloudy weather prevailed during the earl morning, but cleared for a short time before noon. $9 2.30 p. m. the sky w~ again overcast b cirrus and a to stratus clouds, m o m ra idly from
clouds was rising along the western horizon, moving gradually to the northwest. By 3.30 p. m. dark and ominous appearin clouds extended aong the north-
the city with the speed of an express train, and the darkness of the early evenin . The darkness lasted but a
few minutes, when the conition was relieved by lighter colored clouds from the north. The winds ranged from 18 to 30 miles per hour from the south from midnight until 9.30 a: m., changing to southwest after that time’ and increasing in velocity to 40 miles per hour by 2 p. m. At 3.45 p. m. the winds shifted from southwest to northwest, with one ninute from the west and immediately reached an extreme velocity of 74 miles per hour, yith a maximum velocity for a 5-minute period of 54 mles per hour. At least a
dozen houses and barns were blown down within the city, hundreds of trees were broken off’ or uprooted, and much damage done to both telephone and electricrlight wires. A wmd0.w in the Government building, 4 b 6
wide. There was no evidence of a whrl, except as the wind shifted from the southwest to the northwest, and
the greater number of trees and houses were blown due east or slightly to the northeast. The highest velocity of the wind as recorded,on the tower of the Government building was from the northwest. Temperature and pressure records indicate clearly the violence and rapidity of the changes. A temperature of
80° was recorded at 3.45 p. m., breakin the record for
last 25 years, and fallin from 80° to 13’ at midnight,
this early in the month of November. Rain, hail, sleet, and snow fell within a period of lese than two hours, and
a modsrate electric storm commenced after the tem- erature had fallen to below freezing and more than an [our after the wind had shifted. The center of this disturbance probably passed some- what to the north of this city, and there was an abnor- mally rapid rise in pressure from 29.3 inches at 3.45 p. m. of the 11th to 29.8 inches at 7 p. m. The record for varieties of weather and violent fluctua- tions in meteorological elements during a 24-hour period has not heretofore been equaled at this station.
erature conditions as is s f own by the records at Spring-
reading was followed % y a rise in pressure of 1 inch in
t z e southwest, while a dense greenish %& lac bank of
western honzon an 2 at 3.45 p. m. this cloud 0-vershadowed
feet, was blown in and entirely across a room 20 B eet
high temperature during any previous 8 ovember in the
which hkewise breaks t % e record for low temperature