January 28th, 1986: On a cold morning, the Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart at 11:39 am EST, 73 seconds after liftoff from the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida. Starting in the 20s, the ground temperature at liftoff was 36 degrees. 1/2

The thing is, even developers think their productivity is the bottleneck (but that's mostly because there's nothing developers like more than development itself, otherwise they wouldn't be doing it - that's the strength and the problem).

Political Scientists would call it a "tactical concession" (RRS' Spiral Model). Human rights and democracy campaigners need to make sure it leads to more gains (positive spiral) instead of stalling progress (negative spiral).

Serious impacts have occurred due to ice accumulations across the South, with ~800K still without power and incredible sleet accumulations causing roof collapses in parts of AR. I am VERY concerned about hypothermia risks & pipe burst potential from bitter cold tonight. tinyurl.com/43kcrhmb

These AI companies are really different. - OpenAI: Used to be true believers but now mostly cynical scam - Google: Sure we can throw AI everywhere as well. No we still don't have product management or strategy - Anthropic: But dude what if my stochastic model is my soul mate? Or god?

You will never forget that. A is attractive; like Kangaroos #AMS2026

Presidential forum fun. “Think deeply. Act Responsibly. Move with Purpose” #AMS2026

Now that we are gaining traction on freezing rain obs, maybe time to tackle Sleet

4h15m agenda in a 1-345pm time slot. Seems legit.

I just gifted two separate people "Work in Progress" (thanks @dingdingpeng.the100.ci) and now I know my new thing is reading pre-2022/2023 articles about topics everyone is panicking and saying not much new today worksinprogress.co/issue/the-sp... worksinprogress.co/issue/real-p...

As heavy snow and ice approach, we must all work together to stay safe. Our Montgomery County leaders have created a central portal for sharing the latest winter storm information. Hang tough!

Emergency declarations for the winter storm are pouring in… Again cannot emphasize enough how massive the geographic scope of this storm is and how that alone will complicate response efforts.

Attention folks in the weather, climate, disaster, wildfire, and Earth science communities: NSF has just published a new "Dear Colleague" letter inviting feedback (by Mar 13) on the proposal to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). www.nsf.gov/funding/...

more on NSSLs FRANA, tested in the HMT: inside.nssl.noaa.gov/nsslnews/202...

Last term I tried an experiment: I walked into my Tech and Design Ethics class, admitted that I had *no idea* what to do about ChatGPT - so I would let them figure it out. As in: their first project was to decide and write the ChatGPT policy for the class. Here's what happened:

University partners around the country are launching weather balloons today as part of CUSP-ARR in support of AR-RECON and other field campaigns. Data are being ingested into the operational models for improved predictions!

Big launch from @earthmover.io today! Now you can access high-quality ARCO data directly from trusted providers via our Data Marketplace.

Implementation science: translating research into practice. Its not just for medicine

A minor rant at 8 am - model probability space is underdispersed. We really need to be careful about presenting model probabilities as actual probability. Just look at the current northward trend across nearly all guidance.

"This is such a strange decision with no clear rationale. None of it really makes sense.”

the only exploding trees are when they are weighed down by heavy wet snow or ice. blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org/allin/2015/0...

i see we are rediscovering the joys of synoptic variability in medium range models….

More like Aurora Jeal-alis, he says, after multiple attempts at northern pointing sky shots of disappointment

Speakers include... @padilla.senate.gov Sen John Curtis Annie Schmidt, Alliance for Wildfire Resilience Kelly Martin, Lasair Fire Consulting Group LLC Sara Clark, Shute, Mihaly & Weinberger Dr. Michael Falkowski, Earth Fire Alliance Dr. Hannah Safford, FAS Sign up ⤵️ www.eesi.org/briefings/vi...

🦅🪶#Raptors

Thank you for your resilience, your persistent brilliance...it transformed how the world navigates & understands our planet. Your work touches nearly every modern device & journey and more people should know your name. Goodnight and godspeed, Gladys West.🕯️ thezebra.org/2026/01/18/d... #WomenInSTEM

Atmospheric chemist Susan Solomon was born #OTD in 1956. Solomon, working with colleagues at NOAA, proposed/confirmed the cause of the Antarctic ozone hole, chlorofluorocarbons. She led the Nat'l Ozone Expedition to Antarctica to collect evidence & was the only woman on the team. #WomenInSTEM (1/2)

the annual meeting is infected with the AI. the number of competing, related sessions is amazing. its so large and should take the new title: the uncoordinated giant conference.

Good read. the jobs to be done need to be understood before you automate worksinprogress.co/issue/the-al...

The neighborhood trees have mounded mulch. The snow has covered those only so they look like frosted cupcakes with a candle

Yellow reflectivity is now yielding fat aggregates

Yay snow!

snow pellets seen. Not enough of them to be honest, but ill take whatever winter i can get. #mdwx

I've been thinking about this again this week. We all deserve a lot of grace right now. For ourselves and for each other.

brunch with the crunch bunch

Something else that really struck me in this report is this paragraph. "AI is doing things for students that they used to enjoy."

Artificial Unintelligence: the government is in full retreat over copyright, and the attempts to make it look dignified only make it funnier. My SKETCH. thecritic.co.uk/arti...

In Friday's debrief, I wrote about massive new awards for NSF Tech Labs. There's an introductory webinar tomorrow www.nsf.gov/events/intro... & more information at: sam.gov/workspace/co... (scroll down to bottom for PDF)

I am calling for a complete and total boycott of the Mercator projection in all news stories about Greenland until every member of the American public has seen this

if you put this in a script even erin brockovitch would be like “too on the nose, dial it back”

Good morning clouds

worksinprogress.co/issue/the-al... Works in Progress is a delight to read

Spied khi in these wave clouds overhead. #mdwx

ASOND rain: 7.46” Normal: 18.86” Not a 1” day in that span for me. #mdwx

The IEM is a national treasure. thanks for your help @akrherz.bsky.social

This is an important, albeit depressing, read. www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

Amanda Gorman wrote this poem for Renee Good and that’s it for me tonight.

Remembering today that having your heart broken is a necessary step on the path to becoming fully human. Whichever heartbreak is your first, it’s probably critical that a state break your heart so that you can develop a political imagination. If this is your first, I’m sorry and also welcome.

This is also a field test. If the press lets them muddy the waters on executing a woman in Minneapolis despite multiple witnesses and video recordings clearly depicting what happened, the message they'll take away is that there's nothing they can't get away with. Nothing.

Damn those were great short program routines. Go Team USA!!