Inherit the Wind...

NASA Satelite Photo

"This year's Atlantic hurricane season will be "above normal," with 12 to 18 storms, thanks in part to unusually warm ocean temperatures, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said yesterday.

"Six to 10 of those storms are likely to reach hurricane strength, the agency said in its initial forecast for the 2011 storm season, which begins June 1 and ends Nov. 1. NOAA forecasters expect three to six of those storms to become major hurricanes with winds reaching 111 miles per hour or greater.

"Because we have insufficient funds in the [fiscal] '11 budget, we are likely looking at a period of time a few years down the road where we will not be able to do the severe storm warnings and long-term weather forecasts that people have come to expect today," Lubchenco said in remarks at NOAA's Satellite Operations Center in Suitland, Md."

Part of the lacking funds in the '11 balance sheet is the Real Politick played out during the recent budget negotiations on "The Hill" in full spectacle of the world to our folly.

I sincerely hope, now living in New York, that the worst-case models from the US Army Corp of Engineers are uncharacteristically off-the-mark.

In this case, ignorance is [not] strength, nor is it bliss.

Scientific American: As Big Hurricane Season Looms, NOAA Chief Calls Satellite Cuts a "Disaster"
NOAA: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Thomas Gray: Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College