By Mary O’KEEFE

One of my favorite memories is a summer storm in the Midwest that was just part of every August. The leaves on the trees would get this eerie light green color, the clouds that were white just a few minutes prior would turn gray and heavy, birds stopped chirping and an amazing smell of rain filled the air. I would be outside with my friends and instinctively we would take a moment to look up, close our eyes and take a deep breath of fresh rain on the horizon. Then we’d run to the house as quick as we could because in a brief moment could come a downpour. Watching a light rainstorm out of a big picture window would sometimes change quickly as lightning would strike, thunder would boom and we would pack up to go to the cellar. It was always amazing how farmers could predict the storm days before it hit. Some would say it was the way the wind blew the soil, others would credit cattle behavior and still others would rub a previous broken bone or an arthritic knee, nonchalantly predicting the storm that was brewing.

People now just check their smartphones if they want to find short-term weather predictions. For something more substantial some will listen to local news weather segments or the Weather Channel and, of course, there was always the tried and true “The Old Farmer’s Almanac,” first published in 1818 that has been a favorite for many. For centuries, people have tried to predict and understand the weather – a process that has evolved from being based mostly in religion to being based in science. People continue to try to predict and explain Mother Nature.

“Around 650 B.C., the Babylonians tried to predict short-term weather changes based on the appearance of clouds and optical phenomena such as haloes. By 300 B.C., Chinese astronomers had developed a calendar that divided the year into 24 festivals, each festival associated with a different type of weather,” according to NASA Earth Observatory.

Aristotle, a Greek philosopher, wrote “Meteorologica” in mid 340 B.C., which included theories about the formation of rain, clouds, hail, wind, thunder, lightning and hurricanes. As scientific instruments became more accurate and science evolved the theories were adjusted.

In the 1400s those who were natural philosophers who studied the natural world including weather gave way to new scientific discoveries. In western civilization, the first known design of a hygrometer (an instrument to measure the humidity of air) was described by Nicholas Cusa (1401 to 1464). Galileo Galilei invented an early thermometer in 1592 and Evangelista Torricelli invented the barometer for measuring atmospheric pressure in 1643. This ushered in a new era of science-based weather studies, which included the invention of the telegraph and the telegraph network in the mid-19th century that allowed weather observers and compilers to share data. Weather observing stations began to spread throughout the world and synoptic weather forecasting based on data analysis was born.

Now organizations like the Jet Propulsion Laboratory use satellites and instruments provide up-to-date weather information. The satellites observe weather events including atmospheric rivers, the flow of tropical moisture across the Pacific Ocean to the U.S. West Coast, and haboobs and other dust storms (strong winds that begin in the Sahara Desert in Sudan). Extreme haboobs have blown across the world to reach the U.S. These instruments are also able to study fire weather and, according to JPL/NASA, some large fires dramatically increase their heat and winds to generate their own weather.

The good thing is that “The Old Farmer’s Almanac” has published its 2022 edition, which makes it their 204th year of publication. Today it can be found online at www.farmersalmanac.com. Now people can get their weather from multiple sources – from a weather app, weather station, local media and, of course, by looking up into the sky to read the clouds, smell the air and feel the twinge in an old broken bone.