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The most direct way to find your question is to search for the name you used when you submitted it (first name, last name or both). If you did not include a name, then you can search using keywords from your question. Of course, since many weather-related terms are common to a lot of the questions we receive, this may turn up a number of others in addition to your own.

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Answer: The high-impact, threatening weather and geological events are certainly easier to choose from and pack a nice punch for names. If you're looking for something more associated with nice weather and (usually) brighter skies, you might consider the somewhat obscure and vaguely exotic sounding "CAVU" (pronounced KAV-oo, and sounding a bit like a tribe name from "Survivor," perhaps). It is a somewhat informal aviation weather term that stands for "Ceiling And Visibility Unrestricted."
Jun. 28, 2009 | Tags: careers & education

Answer: Rainfall rates and amounts varied greatly across the area during that event, but there were places that received on the order of 3-6 inches of rain, mostly within a 6-hour or shorter time span. Based on information from NOAA's Precipitation Frequency Data Server, 3 inches in 6-hours for our area has about a 5-year return interval, while the 4 inches or so we received here at WRAL is about a 20-year event. Locations receiving 5-6 inches in so short a time experienced roughly 100 to 300-year rain rates.
Jun. 29, 2009 | Tags: flooding, records/extremes

Answer: We certainly do not intend to cause ear burns with our weathercasts. Perhaps it will help to review the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, our copy of which defines "century" as (1) a subdivision of a Roman Legion, (2) a group or sequence of 100 like things, and (3) a period of 100 years. The second definition would seem to include room for the idea that Fahrenheit degrees above zero on a temperature scale could be one of the "like things" it refers to.
Jun. 30, 2009 | Tags: heat

Answer: So long as you are otherwise inside a lightning-safe environment, the laptop should not present a hazard. This assumes that you do not have it connected to any wiring that could carry a current indoors, such as a power cord or an internet connection. The situation is similar to that for a cordless phone or cell phone used indoors during a storm. As long as there is not a conduit like a phone line or charging cord attached, they should be safe to operate.
Jun. 24, 2009 | Tags: lightning, weather & health

Answer: Teams from NOAA, Colorado State University and NCSU that specialize in seasonal forecasts call for anywhere from 9 to 14 named storms for 2009, compared to a normal of 10, with 4 to 8 becoming hurricanes compared to a normal of six, for an overall forecast of a fairly typical year. Unfortunately, there is no method by which we can confidently predict the behavior of individual storms that have not formed yet, so how many may affect our state remains an open question. You can find 2009 names under "Naming a Storm" in our "Hurricanes" section.
Jun. 25, 2009 | Tags: hurricanes

Answer: The mean temperature at the Raleigh-Durham airport for December 2008 - February 2009 was 44.4 degrees, about 2.6 degrees above normal. By comparison, the same period in winter 1995-1996 averaged out to 40.0 degrees, notably colder. The coldest on record for the same location was December 1976 - February 1977, when the average temperature for the winter was only 34.3 degrees.
Jun. 26, 2009 | Tags: cold, past weather, winter weather

Answer: On the day in question (Tuesday June 16th, 2009) winds below about 6-8,000 feet became easterly as the day wore on, so that some fairly shallow rain showers were carried along toward the west. At the same time, deeper showers and rain generated at higher altitudes by a passing upper level disturbance were moved along toward the east-southeast by winds from the west-northwest above 6-8,000 feet. This provided a very good illustration of vertical wind shear.
Jun. 27, 2009 | Tags: weather radar, winds

Answer: Sometimes when a layer of stable air that is moist but not quite saturated flows across a terrain obstacle like a mountain or a ridge line, the air is forced upward. If this cools the lifted air sufficiently, a smoothed layer of cloud may form on the upwind side and then rapidly dissipate again where the air subsides farther downwind of the obstacle. These orographically-induced phenomena are a type of "lenticular" cloud, and have on occasion led to UFO reports from observers unfamiliar with them!
Jun. 23, 2009 | Tags: clouds, cool sites

Answer: The change in temperature with height is called the lapse rate, and the average for what is called the "Standard Atmosphere" is for temperature to decrease about 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit for each 1000 feet of additional elevation. However, this is only an average and the actual rate can vary widely. On a sunny, dry day with a well-mixed lower atmosphere, the temperature often falls about 5.5 degrees per 1000 feet, while it may only fall a degree or two per 1000 feet on a rainy day, and may increase rapidly with height when a temperature inversion is present.
Jul. 1, 2009 | Tags: general meteorology

Answer: Yes they can. The most recent tornado reported in San Jose was an F0 twister that occurred in December 1997. It covered a path length of less than a mile with a width around 100 yards, and produced around $20,000 in damage to some mobile homes. There have been at least five other tornadoes in surrounding Santa Clara county since 1950, two of which produced F2-level damage.
Jul. 2, 2009 | Tags: tornadoes