Review Sheet for Exam 5
EXTREMELY SERIOUS WARNING: This review sheet was written without looking at the examination. There is no guarantee that everything that is on the exam is also on this sheet. Similarly, there is no guarantee that everything on this sheet will be on the exam. The purpose of the review sheet is to help the student understand which topics and key words were most important in this block of the course. Consider yourself warned.
Key Terms
forecast models, ensemble forecasting, time step
auroras, magnetosphere, solar wind, inferior mirage, superior mirage, fata morgana, sun dogs, sun pillars, halos, refraction, crepuscular rays
sleet, rain, snow, freezing rain, graupel, hail, lake-effect snow, Alberta Clipper, Gulf/Atlantic Storm, Colorado lows (a.k.a., "Four Corners Lows"), wind chill, hypothermia, frost bite
cloud seeding, overseeding, dry ice, silver dioxide, wind machines, smudge fires, sprinklers
anthropogenic climate change, urban heat islands, acid rain, global warming, global thermostat hypothesis
Key Concepts
Understand the basics of how computer forecast models work. For example, know that the observations of the weather have to be converted to a regular grid, and that we apply the seven basic equations to each gridpoint for each "time step", and that by repeating this process thousands of times we get a forecast. Know how a meteorologist takes the output of many such "models" and creates an "ensemble forecast". Know what a TV meteorologist does (in contrast to what a "forecaster" does). Know what types of information go INTO a forecast model.
Know the seven "primitive equations" (well, not the equation, obviously, but what the equation means).
You'll be expected to know the temperature patterns in the atmosphere that lead to inferior and superior mirages. You'll need to know what each type of mirage looks like.
Know different strategies for fog dissipation. Know about what cloud seeding is, how it works, and what kinds of clouds it will or will not work on. Know about the various weather modification strategies--such as forcibly changing the weather, modifying the surface of the earth, etc.
Know how climate is different from weather. Know about the kinds of evidence we have that climate change is happening. Know roughly how much the earth has warmed in the last century, and why scientists think this is happening.
You do need to know all the different types of climates: A, B, C, D, E, and H. For each climate, be able to describe what the weather is like in the summer and in the winter. Being able to use vocabulary terms like tundra, taiga, savannah, rain forest, etc. will be very useful.
Know the meteorological definition of "winter". Know the differences between the various temperature profiles that result in either rain, freezing rain, sleet or snow. Know where you would find such types of precipitation along a warm front. Understand how hail is different from sleet. Understand how lake-effect snow occurs. Know about the different kinds of weather patterns that commonly lead to snowfall.