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MonsoonMaiden

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  1. MonsoonMaiden
    Being in the civil service, we are able to book Cluny Lodge, a bungalow owned by the Singapore government. D often suggested we stay there, but I kept putting it off because I liked Strawberry Park & am usually lazy to try anything new. Our colleague C the Toothbrush Man brought his family there to stay once, though, & after hearing about it from him I decided to give it a try.

    Lane leading to Cluny Lodge, lined by firs supposedly planted by Lee Kuan Yew; Cluny Lodge in morning sunlight
    In the end I was very glad we went. It is a little stone bungalow, & it turned out to be much nicer than staying in a hotel because it was more homelike. There were large windows everywhere with views of the surrounding hills and the garden, which was well-tended and full of flowers. Since it was off-peak season we had the entire bungalow & garden to ourselves.
    I liked the dining area; the plates used were similar to those used in my grandmother's house when I was a child, & made me feel nostalgic. There were also vases of yellow roses & chrysanthemums set on the table, which I guessed were from the garden. Meals were provided & the food was really good, with soups, main dishes, dessert, plus coffee/tea/Chinese tea. It was like home-cooked food, with a choice of Chinese or western.

    Dining room; plate; bedroom
    Cluny Lodge is near Sri Menanti. D's grandfather has passed away, but Mr Lim, the caretaker at Cluny, remembers him well. In fact, D had a great time talking to Mr Lim & family (all in Cantonese, so I didn't follow much) about his grandfather & old times. On the last evening after dinner, he went off to the kitchen to settle the bill while I stayed in the bedroom & read my book; & he was gone so long that I knew they must be having another of those nostalgic sessions.

    Front of Lodge; view from the front; rosy clouds at sunset
    He finally came back, rather excited. Apparently Mr Lim said that Lee Kuan Yew (Singapore's first Prime Minister) was staying here (at Cluny) around the time of Separation from Malaysia. In fact, Mr Lim said Mr Lee was here when the writ of separation was delivered to him, & also that Mr Lee had planted quite a no. of the old fir trees around the Lodge.
    Mr Lim says that the bungalow is historic, & that it's sort of modelled after a castle, because it's one of the few bungalows around which has a basement/cellar. Apparently Mr Lee must have liked the bungalow, because he arranged for it to be leased to the Singapore govt for a limited period. In another 25 years, it will go back to the Malaysian govt. Pity.

    Steps leading down from the Lodge to a little playground; garden; rose in garden
    We didn't trek around much this time, but we did go down to Tanah Rata so that I could make my usual visit to the ceramics shop. We also took an early morning walk to have a look at Sri Menanti, but there were guests there, so we decided not to disturb the caretaker. On the way back, we saw a huge millipede on the road. It looked like a fat sausage or a miniature minibus, trundling along. One little tap & it curled up into a perfect sphere. We rolled it into the grass, in case a car came along & crushed it.

  2. MonsoonMaiden
    We had a fairly typical "Sumatra" on 15 Aug. "Sumatra" is a nickname for a squall line that often forms over the Indonesian land mass of Sumatra & then moves over the Malacca Straits to affect Singapore and Malaysia.

    This particular Sumatra seems to have started organising itself just before affecting Singapore.

    "Sumatras" often affect us during the night, between 3am and 6am; one can see a line of echoes on the radar steadily making its way eastward. If there's no bad weather around we can usually get a bit of rest during night shifts between 11pm and 3am, but if you're expecting a "Sumatra" then you can forget about getting any rest because you have to keep monitoring it.

    Sometimes the squall line weakens and dissipates upon moving over land, but the stronger ones will continue moving eastward out into the South China Sea.

    This one has reorganised into quite a distinct line but looks as if it's weakening as it moves out to the sea area.
    Sumatras are one of our more intense weather systems & usually occur during the Southwest Monsoon, but we can actually get them any time the steering level winds change to southwesterlies. They bring strong gusts & heavy rain, & spectacular lightning & thunder. They can move in during the day instead, & we usually refer to these as "late Sumatras". Once you know one is coming in, then forecasting is standard. You can usually estimate what time it'll arrive & get as much of your routine work done as possible plus get all the warnings ready.
    I remember nights at home hearing the onset of one. You can hear the wind picking up & the tinkle of flowerpots falling & doors slamming. One colleague joked that it sounded like a typhoon coming. It can often be seen approaching in the early morning too, a line of cumulonimbus moving in from the west, the cloud tops pink or gold in early morning sunlight.
    A schoolteacher called one morning, sounding worried because she & her students had seen one. She quavered, "Oh ... is it ... is it a front approaching?" She was probably a geography teacher & her students must have been asking her about it.
    Of course the squall line often just misses Singapore, passing to the north over Malaysia or to the south instead. Sometimes if the steering winds are northwesterlies, the radar will show a line of echoes moving down the Malacca Straits, only affecting the western or southern parts of the island.
    A colleague was once annoyed because his Sumatra seemed to be heading for Singapore dead on, but just before hitting the island, suddenly divided into two. One part went north, while the other passed south of us, & after skipping the island it actually merged back into one and moved out into the South China Sea! He couldn't believe his eyes; he had gotten all his warnings ready & been forecasting strong winds & rain for nothing. He was convinced the squall line had done it on purpose to spite him! Well, that's the nature of forecasting.
  3. MonsoonMaiden

    Von Karman Vortices

    By MonsoonMaiden,

    A Von Karman vortex street caused by the airflow over the island of Jan Mayen in the Greenland Sea :

    Such vortices can be seen in many other places; these trails off Alaska's Aleutian Islands are even more spectacular :

    I must confess I have a soft spot for the Jan Mayen vortices, though, because Jan Mayen was where I first heard of the phenomenon ... the book Spacious Skies had several photos of them. I find them amazing - never realised such regular & intricate cloud patterns existed. :lol:
    Spacious Skies began that section by saying, "Jan Mayen is one of the most interesting islands in the world ..." It is a little-known Norwegian-administered island, 600 km north of Iceland, hosting the northernmost active volcano (Beerenburg) on earth, & covered with a great glacier. It is uninhabited except for a rotating crew of 18 people, manning the LORAN and meteorological stations (Info taken from this site).
    Some other Von Karman vortex links :
    About Von Karman vortex streets
    Von Karman vortices in other locations
    SPACE.com article
  4. MonsoonMaiden
    Tropical Storm "Greg" (43W) was an unusual weather system in that tropical cyclones (TCs) seldom occur at latitudes low enough to affect Malaysia. The country is divided into West Malaysia (Peninsular Malaysia) and East Malaysia (consisting of the states of Sabah & Sarawak).

    GMS IR image at 240400Z. 2 hours later, the JTWC upgraded the cloud cluster to Tropical Depression status
    "Greg" was first observed as a cloud cluster that developed on the night of 20 Dec 1996, over the South China Sea to the northeast of East Malaysia. Cloud clusters are a common feature in this area during the Northeast Monsoon, but this one proved to be unusually long-lived, with convective development enhanced by low-level convergence between westerly winds and northeasterly monsoonal flow. On 240600Z the Joint Typhoon Warning Centre (JTWC) assigned it tropical depression status. Winds to the north of the system continued to be enhanced by the northeasterly monsoon, so that by 250000Z tropical storm intensity had been reached. The storm's movement was unusual : it began tracking east-southeast toward the East Malaysian coast.

    "Greg" affecting Sabah on Christmas night.
    “Greg” moved into Sabah at around 251600Z (Christmas night), depositing heavy rains that triggered floods and caused rivers to overflow their banks. Powerlines were downed, water supplies disrupted and road and communication links washed out. The storm affected a total of 17000 people from 226 villages along Sabah’s west coast. At least 163 people died, most of them migrant workers. The sad thing about these workers is that many had entered the country illegally from Indonesia & were never accounted for. Another 3000 were left homeless.

    Post-analysis from JTWC 1996 Pacific Typhoon Season Summary :
    Greg's east-southeastward motion was very unusual. TCs which form within (or move into) the South China Sea late in the year are often blocked from moving west by well-established northeasterly monsoon flow. Such TCs often remain quasi-stationary or move southwestward and dissipate.

    242330Z Dec GMS imagery showing five tropical cyclones : Greg (G), Fern (FN),
    Ophelia (OP), Phil (P) and Fergus (FG) lying within twin monsoon troughs
    Greg formed in the South China Sea when an unusual large-scale wind pattern dominated the region : During the second half of Dec 1996, twin low-latitude monsoon troughs became established between approx 100 deg E and 170 deg E, one trough north and the other south of the equator, and a belt of low-level westerly winds existed in equatorial latitudes between them. A total of five tropical cyclones - two in the northern hemisphere and three in the southern hemisphere - were formed within these monsoon troughs.
    It is hypothesized that the strong westerly winds to the south of Greg provided the flow asymmetry responsible for its eastward motion. This factor plus the existence of the large circulation of Fern (42W) to Greg's northeast were cited as possible sources of the east-southeast movement of Greg.
  5. MonsoonMaiden

    Weather Cartoons

    By MonsoonMaiden,

    There are a lot of funny weather cartoons on the net, like this one :

    However I can't find any I like as much as the following two, which have been pasted on my locker for years :

    I love Woodstock; :lol: he's just so cute. :lol:
  6. MonsoonMaiden
    In early 1998, we heard that a team of mountaineers from Singapore was planning to try climbing Mt Everest. They were hoping MSS could provide them with weather data, & I remember two of the team (I think Khoo Swee Chiow & Johann Annuar) coming to our office to have a look at what was available. Unlike the days of Edmund Hillary, things are so high-tech now that we were able to email the data to them every day.
    Since that first expedition, there have been many others, but at the time it was a novelty especially as Singapore is a tropical island & does not have an alpine environment. Public interest in mountain climbing was limited to nearby Mt Kinabalu & Mt Ophir, & although a lot of Singaporeans do go trekking in Nepal, something like a full-scale climb of a mountain like Everest was unheard of.
    The media gave the team quite a lot of coverage, & at that time the Singapore Omnitheatre also decided to feature the film "EVEREST - The Movie". It was interesting discovering how gruelling the climb can be. I also approved of the respect our climbers showed for the mountain - when the press kept harping about how we were going to "conquer Everest", one of the team finally said, "We do not conquer Chomalungma (as the Tibetans call the mountain). Chomalungma, if she is willing, allows us to climb her."

    Edwin Siew & Khoo Swee Chiow at the summit
    Since we were providing them with weather data, I was more than a little interested in the team's progress, & was glad when two of the climbers, Edwin Siew and Khoo Swee Chiow, made it to the summit on 27 May 1998. I think a lot of people didn't really believe they would make it. There was, however, quite a furore when it was discovered that the two who planted the Singapore flag on the summit were Malaysians (Singapore permanent residents). David Lim, the team leader, has given answers to this and other objections. (Incidentally, both Edwin Siew & Khoo Swee Chiow have since taken up Singapore citizenship).
    After their success, the team was grateful to those who had supported & believed in their cause, & posed with various sponsors' banners for photos. They asked MSS if we had a banner (we had sent them the data free of charge) but it hadn't occurred to us to have one made. When I later contacted Johann Annuar to ask for a few photos for our Annual Report, he was most helpful.
    Johann was an undergrad at NUS at the time & I met up with him at his hostel (Eusoff Hall) to look through the photos. I asked him for an account of the weather conditions there, & came up with this report :
    "One of the major obstacles to the expedition’s success was the harsh weather conditions the team would experience. The timing of the expedition was scheduled with this in mind, taking place from early March (the end of winter) to late May (late spring) when conditions are mildest. At over 8000 metres above sea-level – almost the cruising level of most commercial aircraft – air is extremely thin; team members risked the danger of mountain sickness, and had to spend several weeks acclimatizing as they ascended from Camp 4 to Base Camp. With only a thin layer of atmosphere as a shield against radiation from space, sunlight, and in particular ultraviolet radiation, was very intense, so much so that temperatures during the daytime at Base Camp tended to become quite hot; a thermometer in one of the tents was known to have recorded more than 40oC at one time. During the nights, temperatures inside the tents would plummet to –20o C, while outside the tents, with windchill and other factors, it reached as low as –40oC.

    Khoo Swee Chiow showing two extremes of temperature
    Base Camp was mostly sheltered from the more severe forms of weather, being surrounded on three sides by mountains at the end of a valley. The weather there followed a diurnal cycle, with mornings starting off fair and temperatures becoming quite warm in the afternoons. At around 4pm, conditions would normally deteriorate as katabatic winds would start to blow down from the higher peaks, bringing extensive snow with them.

    Strong winds blow snow off the summit
    The team suffered a setback on 1 April when a violent windstorm swept down upon the camp around 2am, sending team members scrambling for cover as tent poles snapped and tents collapsed. Nearly all the Singapore team’s tents were destroyed. Team members estimated the winds ranged between 120-150 km/hr, while the sherpas present claimed that winds of such force are usually only encountered at much higher altitudes. The incident set the expedition back for about a week as new tents and equipment had to be obtained.

    Aftermath of the windstorm
    A bad spate of weather also occurred during the second week of May, when heavy snowfall reduced visibility to 200 metres and winds of up to 180 km/hr were whipping the mountain. The weather was so severe that the team built a helicopter landing pad near Base Camp in case they needed to be evacuated at short notice.

    Another threat to the expedition came from farther afield in the form of Tropical Cyclone “01B” which formed in the Bay of Bengal on 18 May. Its presence caused the Singapore team some anxiety as after making landfall, the remnants of the cyclone could easily track over to the Himalayas and cause heavy snowfall over the Everest region. This might have been so had the storm tracked north-northwest; fortunately, it chose to follow a more northeasterly track, making landfall near Chitaggong, Bangladesh, before dissipating on 20 May with minimal effect on the expedition."
  8. MonsoonMaiden

    Holiday In Wales

    By MonsoonMaiden,

    After the Hurricane Workshop in Miami, I met D at Heathrow & we rented a car & drove straight to Wales. It might have been more logical to stay on in the U.S. & have a holiday there, but I wasn't so familiar with getting around the U.S. & driving on the right side of the road; I'd lived a year in the UK & I wanted a holiday where I could really relax. I chose Wales because I'd already been around Scotland & England.
    Some of the places we visited were Tenby, Aberystwyth, Landudno & Lake Vyrnwy. We drove through Pembrokeshire & Snowdonia National Park. Initially I thought of stopping at Carmartheon, which I think is where Merlin is supposed to have been born, but we didn't in the end.

    I liked Aberystwyth where we stayed at a B&B right next to the seafront. We had an attic room all panelled with wood which made it look cosy, & if it hadn't been raining so much, we would have had a good view of sea. As it was, the weather was pretty bad & the waves were strong & we could hear them crashing down on the shore the entire time we were there. I spent the whole night just listening to them. It made me think of my childhood, when my family used to rent a chalet by sea - I used to listen to the waves on the shore at night, & it's a sound that I think I'll never get tired of.
    We had look at the castle there & also the museum. D got bored in the museum & went outside to wait but I rather liked it. It looked old & a bit run-down, but there was a section on geology which was quite nice, & also some old furniture & ceramics to look at. Another interesting article on display was a set of love spoons, carved by some sailor. I actually copied down the information given :
    The centuries old Welsh custom of giving love spoons meant that a would-be suitor gave a spoon as an indication that he desired to court a particular girl. A girl may therefore have received several spoons from as many suitors. The oldest surviving spoon, made in 1667, is in the Welsh Folk Museum at St Fagan's Castle, Cardiff, although it is known that love spoons were made well before this date by the menfolk of Wales. Love spoons are symbolic, and have several meanings.

    To begin with, they suggest that a suitor can help the one he loves - to food - for which they were originally designed. Later, they became quite ornamental, with long handles and the means by which to hang them on a wall. The designs on the spoon are also symbolic. For instance, a heart means, "my heart is yours". Spoons with cages in which run spheres indicate the number of children the suitor would like to have. Double spoons denote togetherness. A key indicates the key to one's heart.
    I thought it rather nice because it's an old tradition & because of the symbolism. I saw quite a number of love spoons in the souvenir shops later, but they were expensive, 6 pounds just for a teaspoon-sized one, 12 pounds for a larger. In the end I bought one for my parents, since their wedding anniversary was just around the corner.
    At Tenby, I wanted to visit Caldey Island because there is a monastery there, but unfortunately it wasn't the season for visiting. We attended mass at the Church of the Holyrood & St Teilo. I noticed one curious thing about the stained glass - all the windows were plain except for one with what looked like a Great Tit on it. To this day I'm still wondering why - was there some story behind it, or did the stained glass supplier just do it for a joke? I regret not asking the priest there about it.

    Another nice place we stayed at was a B&B which had a view of Cader Idris. I'd heard about this mountain from Susan Cooper's The Grey King - it is supposed to mean "The Seat of Arthur". Our room had a good view (whatever could be seen through the rain) of the mountain, plus Lake Tal-y-Llyn, and sheep grazing in a pasture. The low clouds made the mountain look rather forbidding, which in a way was more interesting than if it had been a fair day. The landlady there told us she'd lived in Singapore four years before the British moved out. This was the second person to tell us such a thing - in Tenby, the landlord told us that he'd lived in Seletar before.
    We also took a detour to visit a reservoir called Nant-y-moch. This was really isolated and the road was extremely narrow. Being from Singapore, it was quite an experience to be in the middle of nowhere with not a soul for miles except for sheep. When we got to the reservoir, the wind was really strong. There was a small monument to Owain Glyndwr (a Welsh hero) there. I wanted to get out of the car to read the inscription, but the wind almost blew me away when I opened the door.

    We also visited Lake Vyrnwy, which was lovely because it really seemed unspoiled. There were very few buildings there - one hotel, one farm, & some small shops, including an RSPB store. The weather had cleared by this time & when we arrived in the evening, the sunset over the lake made a good picture. The B&B, not surprisingly, was already taken, so there was no place to stay except the hotel which was pretty expensive. There were some bird-viewing huts scattered along the lake, & the following morning we spent a few hours sitting inside one of them, watching the birds. I could only recognise the common ones, like the tits. A squirrel also came along to check out the food, and there were some robins. I have a fondness for robins. :lol:

    We also stopped at a craft shop along the way, & the first thing I saw when I entered the door was a stone carving of a little mole sitting on the floor, laughing up at me. He was just so incredibly cute. I was a bit doubtful about buying him, though, because he was heavy, but D chivalrously volunteered to carry him in his hand luggage aboard the plane. In the end I also bought another smaller mole, reclining on its side.
    Wales was cold & it rained half the time we were there. Later, when I'd mentioned this to a friend who works in the UKMO, he joked that I'd chosen a good time to visit - April 2000 had been a record-breaking month for rainfall in many areas, almost three times the national average.
  9. MonsoonMaiden
    We had a flurry of calls from the police, civil defence and the public today, because a distinct waterspout was sighted off the southeastern coast of the island.

    Our radar showed that the weather system producing it was just a small thunderstorm. Which goes to show that you don't need a large and impressive thunderstorm to produce an impressive waterspout.

    What is as amazing as the waterspout is the speed at which news travels nowadays. Practically everyone on this island has a cellphone with a camera in it, and photos were soon being sent to our office and the media. An hour later the local online news websites I checked (Channel Newsasia and the Straits Times) both featured the phenomenon.
    I managed to get this nice series of photos from a colleague, which seems to show the waterspout dissipating.


  10. MonsoonMaiden
    Dec 20, 2006
    24 hours of rain mayhem
    Floods and landslides hit island
    Fallen trees hold up traffic
    SINGAPORE was lashed by the third-largest deluge of rain in recorded history yesterday, causing heavy flooding in parts of the island, bringing down trees and triggering landslides.
    The rain was most intense over the northern and central parts of the island, where flooding affected at least four locations.
    Vehicles were diverted from several traffic junctions, which had been rendered impassable by the rising waters.
    Off Olive Road, the water was waist-deep, submerging nurseries along Thomson Road and paralysing cars, vans and lorries.
    According to the Public Utilities Board (PUB), there was 'spillage' at the nearby MacRitchie Reservoir and at Upper Seletar Reservoir.
    Landslides were reported in two places: along Mandai Road and Bukit Batok West Avenue 2.
    High water was not the only reason for the traffic woes.
    A tree fell along Alexandra Road opposite Ikea, blocking three lanes.
    On Monday night, a tall tree had toppled and smashed through the windows of four flats at a housing block in Joo Seng Road and also damaging a concrete window ledge. Yesterday, Marine Parade Town Council said it was unsure whether the tree had been struck by lightning or had fallen due to strong winds during the thunderstorm. It is deciding whether to remove three other trees on the same slope.
    Aside from the havoc and damage to property, at press time there were no official reports of any deaths or injuries resulting from the rain.
    The only accidents so far have been minor, resulting from mishaps such as people falling into submerged drains.
    The Singapore Civil Defence Force said it had been called in to rescue three employees from an office building along Upper Thomson Road yesterday afternoon, after the flood prevented them from opening a main gate. Firefighters had to cut a hole in the side fence to let them out.
    PUB said yesterday's rainfall was the third-highest recorded in Singapore in the last 75 years. Over a 20-hour period until 8 pm, the highest total rainfall was 345mm, recorded in Yio Chu Kang. This figure far surpasses the entire monthly average for December, which is 284.4mm.
    The highest rainfall recorded in Singapore over 24 hours was 512.4mm in 1978, which resulted in the worst flooding in recent history. The second highest was 467mm, in 1969.
    The National Environment Agency (NEA) said the heavy rain was caused by the north-east monsoon, which started in early December. During the season, there are sudden surges in the north-east winds, which carry a lot of moisture. They usually last two to seven days.
    When heavy rain coincides with high tide, flash floods can result in low-lying areas. The water level in drains and canals becomes so high that the water cannot be drained off quickly enough, causing floods to occur. This is what happened at a kampung in low-lying Lorong Buangkok yesterday.
    Water started rising around the wooden home of 60-year-old housewife Habsah Rohe at around dawn. She frantically took her carpets off the floor and dumped her laundry on her bed.
    Within two hours, the water was up to her knees.
    'What a back-breaking task scooping water out of the house,' she said with a sigh. She may have to get used to it. Wet weather with occasional heavy showers is expected for the rest of the week.
    The NEA's meteorological services division says the wet spell is expected to improve gradually.
  11. MonsoonMaiden
    May 15, 2007
    The sun rises on S'pore's solar industry
    Landmark buildings may go solar; NUS in talks on research, teaching centre
    By Jessica Cheam
    THE solar industry is shaping up as a sunrise one.
    Landmark buildings - and there are so many on this sun-drenched island - may soon sport solar panels that do double duty as roofs.
    Solar-energy architects here are pushing for more than just solar panels slapped atop buildings to turn sunlight into electricity: They want to make what are called photovoltaic panels an intrinsic part of the structure and design of buildings like MRT stations.
    The architecture department of the National University of Singapore (NUS) is now in talks with the Economic Development Board (EDB) to set up a research and teaching centre to promote the concept.
    Details of the Building Integrated PhotoVoltaics (BIPV) Centre have not been finalised, but it is likely to be the first architecture-driven BIPV centre in Asia, said Assistant Professor Stephen Wittkopf of NUS.
    The Straits Times understands that the centre, likely to be run by NUS, will also offer specialised programmes for students and eventually, for professionals, to get a qualification in BIPV.
    BIPV could be the next big thing here, given that National Research Foundation chairman Tony Tan recently declared clean energy - and especially solar energy - as a likely major engine of Singapore's growth by 2015.
    Singapore's thrust into clean energy received an infusion of $170 million from the Government recently as part of a larger $350 million fund set aside for the Republic's green-energy drive.
    Prof Wittkopf said that, with Singapore buildings being chock-a-block and the island's location on the sun belt, it made sense to explore this technology.
    Research on 'solar architecture' is already under way.
    NUS' architecture department has been looking into how feasible it will be to apply this technology to selected buildings like Ang Mo Kio MRT station, the Environment Building in Scotts Road and the Poh Ern Shih Temple in Pasir Panjang.
    How efficient is BIPV?
    It is estimated that a system comprising 2,900 sq m of solar panels - the size of almost half a football field - can generate enough electricity to power about 100 three-room Housing Board flats.
    This is the reckoning of Ms Huang Yi Xiang, 25, who is working towards a master's degree in architecture at NUS. She designed a 280 kilowatt-peak system for the Ang Mo Kio MRT station.
    A kilowatt-peak is a measure of the amount of electricity produced under defined conditions.
    Developing manpower and expertise in the technology is crucial if it is to take off here, stressed Prof Wittkopf.
    He hopes the BIPV centre will do its bit to groom local talent for the solar industry.
    He said: 'Seeing is believing. If people see these panels around them, it creates public awareness and acceptance, which will help create a future demand, and bring prices down to a competitive level.'
    Price is a major dampener on the adoption of solar technology, and this is where the Government can step in, suggested Mr Christophe Inglin, who chairs the Renewable Energy Committee of the Sustainable Energy Association of Singapore.
    He added that BIPV was especially appropriate in Singapore, which cannot spare land for solar plants.
    EDB said it was unable to comment further on the BIPV Centre but confirmed that it was 'in talks with NUS to raise the level of R&D in the area of clean energy'.
    The Building and Construction Authority (BCA) also confirmed that it was in discussion with EDB and NUS and would release more details on the showcase project soon.
  12. MonsoonMaiden
    When Pat & I started work, colleagues would sometimes joke that we should double up as TV weather girls for MSS. Fortunately, MSS tried this out sometime before we joined & scrapped the idea because none of the forecasters was telegenic enough. Personally I would find it quite horrid to have to appear on TV. :lol: Some years later we really did have some weather girls, the first of which was Charlene, sister of one of our local actors Adrian Pang.

    Presenting weather on TV isn't as straightforward as it might seem. For one thing, there is actually nothing behind you but a green screen. There was a PS21 Exhibition at Suntec City that year (its lengthy aim was : to showcase the govt's vision in attaining a 1st-class civil service for the 21st Century), & MSS had a booth with a large green stage where members of the public were allowed to try giving a TV weather presentation. Our boss reminded those of us manning the booth not to wear anything green unless we wanted a disembodied appearance on screen. It was quite a success - I remember one guy who actually went off to buy a green T-shirt & came back wearing it just for the fun of seeing how he'd look with it on TV. :lol: Charlene was there as well, & got to show our then Prime Minister, Mr Goh Chok Tong, the ropes.

    Unfortunately the TV weather presentation was scrapped from the evening news after a while, because it got to be very monotonous. Singapore's daily temperature range doesn't vary much from day to day (around 24 to 32 deg Celsius) & it is possible to get rain every day. There aren't any distinct weather features like frontal systems either; nor is the general public very interested in weather. Also, none of the weather girls lasted very long, partly because none of them were meteorologists (as I think weather presenters in other countries are) - they were using it as a stepping stone to bigger things. We had a whole string of them; one went on to star in some other local TV dramas. There was one who wasn't very good-looking & one of my aunts used to be rather unkind about her. "Who's that girl on TV?! Terrible, her face looks like a horse!!!"

    Charlene & Mr Goh
    Our best presenter was Charlene. It took her a while to get the hang of presenting, but once she did she was very good. My supervisor once remarked that "Charlene's now pointing all over the place on the screen". She left after a while, & the last I heard she'd taken up a career in singing with her own band.
  13. MonsoonMaiden
    Am taking a break from reminiscing to post something more current.
    I was checking out the forum at the Hong Kong Weather Underground for the first time a couple of days ago. This thread caught my attention. I was amused because the members were all lamenting the fact that no tropical cyclone had hit Hong Kong lately, & they were monitoring a tropical depression (07W) currently over the Philippines (see satellite picture below) & debating about whether it would affect Hong Kong or not.

    One thing struck me : In most of the weather forums I've looked at, newcomers are usually welcomed & the senior members are more than happy to explain weather facts to the less learned. In the HK Weather Underground, however, I noticed a member who obviously didn't seem to know as much as the others. He was asking questions about the Tropical Cyclone naming system.
    Shortly after, the Forum Administrator posted this :
    For simple questions try searching the web for answers first. This helps training your research skills. Thank you.
    This is a curious facet of Hong Kong culture that I have sometimes noticed : rather unsympathetic & unsentimental.
    An acquaintance of mine, L, once went travelling in Europe with a friend from Hong Kong. At one of the borders, there was some discrepancy in L's passport, so the customs would not allow her to pass. L's friend got through with no trouble, & instead of waiting for L, got back on the coach & went off without her. L, not being the adventurous sort & finding herself alone in a foreign country, promptly broke down & cried.
    While I was in Reading, I got to know A, this cute little girl from Hong Kong. We used to meet each Sunday & attend church together, & once took a day trip to Cambridge together with a few other people. When the time came for me to return to Singapore, I asked A for her address so that I could keep in touch. She gave it to me, but told me, frankly & cheerfully, that she wasn't going to write letters or keep in touch. She said it without embarrassment, as if it were quite natural. Later I spoke to her British friend Peter who had gone to Cambridge with us, & he said that A had told him exactly the same thing.
    I have a colleague who was originally from Hong Kong, & when asked about this, he just shrugged & said, yup, Hong Kong folks are like that.
    Having said that, however, I must admit that all the meteorologists I've met from the Hong Kong Observatory have been very nice people.

    Anyway, a few days later, I checked the satellite pictures & saw that "07W" (now "Prapiroon", see above) had indeed made landfall on China. (Incidentally, "Prapiroon" is Thai for the god of rain).
    Here is an image of the storm track :

    When I logged on to the HK Weather Underground, the posts were flying fast & furious. Well I am happy for the members - they finally got their much sought-after typhoon! I noticed, though, that they were now also attacking the Hong Kong Observatory with great gusto, criticizing its typhoon forecasts. Heh. And I thought that in Singapore, the Met. Service sometimes has it bad.
  15. MonsoonMaiden
    And I was wondering why the net was so slow. I'd received a dozen SMS alerts on the Taiwan quake, but didn't take much notice because it was so far away ... we're more concerned with quakes around the Sumatra region. Who would think that a quake in Taiwan would still affect us!
    -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Dec 28, 2006, 0.00 am (Singapore time)
    Home users and businesses cut off from websites abroad
    THOUSANDS of home users and companies here found themselves cut off from the Internet on Wednesday morning, after several undersea telecommunications cables were damaged in the Taiwan earthquake.
    In one of the most extensive disruptions here in years, IDD calls to Taiwan as well as two cable TV channels here were also affected.
    Internet users who tried to go online early in the morning found they could not access overseas websites and sometimes failed to send or receive e-mail.
    Access to websites based here, like the Singapore Government's, were not affected, as the traffic did not have to be routed overseas.
    The problem began to ease in the afternoon, when the telecoms traffic was diverted to other cables unaffected by the earthquake.
    By then, however, the breakdown had caused widespread disruption for companies that relied on the Net for business, including big firms with extensive telecoms links.
    Both SingTel and StarHub were inundated with calls from customers.
    SingTel, which co-owns three of the damaged cables as part of a consortium, said work was under way to repair the cables.A StarHub spokesman said Internet users can expect to face slow traffic for at least a few days.
    Transmission of two of StarHub's cable TV channels - Hallmark and TV5Monde - was also disrupted because the images are delivered over the affected cables to Singapore.
    Meanwhile, IDD calls made to Taiwan by SingTel, StarHub and MobileOne customers could not be completed for several hours until evening.
    At SunPage, IDD calls to the United States, Japan and Taiwan were affected, though a spokesman said the problem had been fixed by 6pm, with the exception of calls to Taiwan.
    The downtime also affected news agencies Reuters and Bloomberg, which provide live financial information to markets in the region.
    Bloomberg's wire services in Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and in parts of India were disrupted. The business news agency could not say when services would be fully restored.
    At stockbrokers UOB Kay Hian, online trading was hit. Customers trying to trade shares online had difficulty logging on to its website and also could not view stock charts.
    The problem caught many people here by surprise.
    Even though it was spotted late on Tuesday night, shortly after the first reports of the powerful Taiwan quake, the disruption became clear only on Wednesday morning when many people went online.
    Consultant Steven Ng, 32, said: 'The problem became better in the evening, but it was still on and off when I tried going to Google.'
    The last time users here faced a similar problem was in May last year, when an undersea cable between Singapore and the Philippines was cut. Only StarHub users were affected then.
  16. MonsoonMaiden

    In The Office

    By MonsoonMaiden,

    When Pat & I returned to Singapore, we were each assigned to understudy a senior forecaster and started operational work. The shift considered of a 6-day cycle : 2 day shifts, then a night shift followed by 3 days off. The first day shift was devoted to aviation and shipping, while the second involved public weather forecasts, issuing TAFs & trend statements & sending out lightning risk warnings to various clients, mostly golf courses & construction companies. Night shift included all of these, but fortunately the golf courses & most construction firms closed at night so there were fewer warnings to issue.
    The forecasters have a locker room & I was given my own locker where I kept my met. books & sleeping bag. There was a table there where the kettle & toaster resided. It was also where the forecasters left edibles which were meant to be shared by everyone - usually chocolates or titbits bought during an overseas workshop, or pineapple tarts/various biscuits for Chinese New Year. It was understood that any edibles left on this table were for everyone's consumption. Therefore, leave your personal snacks there at your own peril, or else return & find them gone.
    One custom I found strange was the forecasters' habit of using the word "weather" to imply "bad weather" i.e. any form of precipitation. Eg they would say, "Any weather expected today?" "There was a lot of weather last night." "Shift was OK today, there wasn't any weather." I was mystified at first. How can there be no weather? There is always weather, whether good or bad, sunny or rainy.
    Then it was entertaining to discover the quirks of various colleagues.
    I was assigned to understudy W, a forecaster who used to be from Hong Kong. He was noisy & sociable; he would assign me some job to do, then while I applied myself to it, he would roam around the office, checking the radar & weather charts, & singing various songs in Cantonese. Then he took great relish in ordering me around, checking my work & picking out my mistakes with glee. No matter how carefully I checked my sigwx chart before showing it to him, there was always one little label I'd forgotten to delete or one cloud left unlabelled.
    I got my own back on him, though. One night a member of the public called & asked when the Southern Cross could be seen. Luckily I'd been noticing it above my neighbour's roof around 8pm during that time of the year. W had never heard of the Southern Cross. "What's that?" he asked, and then he looked rather sheepish.
    Another colleague was C. He was excellent at technical things & programming, but occasionally absent minded. He would brush his teeth in the gents' after lunch, put the toothbrush in his back pocket & then forget it was there, & walk around with it sticking out of his back trousers pocket for the rest of the day.
    Then there was S who was a walking encyclopaedia of Chinese culture, & who also had a huge library of books in both English & Chinese. What is remarkable too is that he really reads all his books. He is one of those people who manages to never stop learning & keeping up with things current, whether it be IT (always armed with his pda & mobile phone), developments in met., or current affairs. He is also a certified Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner.
    Then there was H from China, who was already an experienced meteorologist when he joined us. Because of his experience, he was pretty good at doing the routine work. On one occasion, though, I overheard him attending to an enquiry from someone going to Beijing for a holiday.
    "Yes, 7 degrees Celsius," H was saying earnestly, "that is the minimum temperature now." Pause. Then, "No, not cold. 7 is not cold, you wear one jacket should be OK."
    I almost choked on my drink. In Singapore the temperature is quite uniform, usually about 24 to 32 deg Celsius. I waited till he put the phone down, & then, trying not to laugh, told him, "H, to YOU, 7 degrees isn't cold. To a Singaporean, it is VERY cold!" Hopefully the poor caller didn't freeze during his holiday.
    Then there was G. When I first joined, he sported a moustache & everyone joked that he looked like the Hong Kong actor George Lam. In fact, whenever he went to Hong Kong for meetings, he was tickled because the people there also would comment that he looked like George Lam.
    One day, he shocked everyone by shaving the moustache off. It was quite peculiar seeing him without it. When asked about it, he just joked that he was protesting against Taiwanese president Chen Shui-bian's antics of getting himself shot in the stomach.
    The following day, D decided to tease him by pretending not to recognise him. "Who are you?" he demanded fiercely, glaring at G when the latter arrived in the office, briefcase in hand. "Over there, over there, sign your name," waving him toward the counter where visitors are supposed to register.
    G just smiled.
  17. MonsoonMaiden
    The Straits Times
    May 26, 2007
    A towering sight off the east coast
    By Andrea Ong
    THOUSANDS of people from the city centre to Changi were transfixed yesterday afternoon as a large water spout appeared off the east coast.
    The water funnel rose majestically from the sea, and sent people scrambling for their cameras and cellphones.
    In fact, the water spout broke all previous records for reader reaction at The Straits Times' online portal Stomp, with 150 SMSes, MMSes and e-mails streaming in within 10 minutes.
    In all, Stomp received more than 500 images and videos from readers, who used various terms to describe the phenomenon: a tornado, cyclone, hurricane and even 'a finger of God'.
    The spout was large enough to be spotted from Marina Bay, Shenton Way, Kallang, Bedok, the East Coast and even at Changi.
    Staff at Equinox Restaurant - atop the 226m-tall Swissotel The Stamford hotel - were amazed by its size.
    Its manager, Mr Mutto Kawary, 30, said the huge column seemed like it was more than twice the hotel's height.
    The National Environment Agency (NEA) said in a statement that the spout appeared at about 2.30pm off Marine Parade and lasted about 30 minutes.
    Mr Benjamin Li, 24, said he saw an aircraft in its vicinity and feared for the plane's safety. The account executive was in his 31st-storey office in Springleaf Tower in Anson Road.
    'Everyone went quiet,' he said. The plane emerged unscathed.
    Water spouts appear when a type of cloud, cumuliform, forms during thunderstorms, creating low-pressure pockets. A column of water is then sucked up towards the base of the cloud.
    The NEA said water spouts are common in tropical waters and there are usually one or two sightings off Singapore in a year. The last spout was seen in August last year.
    Spouts seem to dissipate fairly quickly. While they can pose a threat to small boats in the water, they usually weaken and vanish when they come nearer to shore.
  18. MonsoonMaiden
    Well, we still have some way to go before biofuels are used in Singapore. But at least this is a beginning.
    -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    The Straits Times
    Oct 9, 2006
    From DIY biodiesel to slick new venture
    By Leong Chan Teik

    IF ALL cars in Singapore ran on diesel, some motorists here might discover a new hobby: making their own fuel. Mr Kom Mam Sun, 32, hit on the idea two years ago and it turned his life around. A former insolvency practitioner who used to deal with bankrupt companies, he started out making enough biodiesel to keep his Nissan truck running. That led him to start a small production outfit and sell to contractors. He is now working on plans for a plant elsewhere in the region.
    Singapore's first biodiesel plant is being built on petrochemicals hub Jurong Island at a cost of around US$20 million (S$31 million), and will start operating in six months or so. The Economic Development Board says there are other projects in the pipeline, but it is not able to say more just yet.
    Biodiesel has been gaining attention, not only because it is environmentally safe and low-polluting, but also because it can be made from such renewable raw materials as animal fats or vegetable oils, and even used cooking oil. It is usually mixed with petroleum-based diesel for use in vehicles.
    With many Internet websites showing how, do-it-yourself biodiesel has become a mini-craze with some motorists in the United States, among other countries. All it takes is a stock of used cooking oil, chemicals and equipment available from hardware stores. It's not rocket science.
    Large-scale commercial production looks likely to take off in and around Singapore, given the easy access to the region's abundant supply of palm oil. Some Singapore companies are planning biodiesel ventures in Malaysia and Indonesia, which together produce 80 per cent of the world's supply of palm oil.
    Biodiesel is largely unfamiliar to people here, but it is not a recent discovery. Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej, for one, began experimenting with biodiesel more than 20 years ago and has a car that runs on it. More recently, it has gained attention and popularity as an alternative fuel source, not least because of the skyrocketing price of crude oil, from which diesel and petrol are derived.
    Prices soared from around US$20 a barrel in the late 1990s to as high as US$78 in July this year, but have settled at around US$60.
    For DIY biodiesel maker Mr Kom, high fossil oil prices provided a push to bigger things, and a career switch to being an entrepreneur. He raised $600,000 from investors, including government agency Spring Singapore, to build a plant in Tuas. Completed in June this year, it can produce up to 1,500 tonnes of biodiesel a month. Its raw material: used cooking oil collected from restaurants.
    Mr Kom sold his biodiesel to contractors in the construction industry, and began making a small profit. He has stopped production temporarily to focus on planning a plant for a potential client in a neighbouring country.
    A big step up from his modest operation is the multimillion-dollar plant coming up on Jurong Island. It is a joint venture between Peter Cremer of Germany, a global trader of commodities, and Malaysia's Kulim Berhad, which runs oil palm plantations.
    The plant will be able to deliver 200,000 tonnes of biodiesel a year and its palm oil feedstock will arrive either by truck or by ship, said Mr Luke Ng, a spokesman for the project. Its output will be exported mainly to the US and Europe.
    In Europe, one in two new cars runs on diesel. It is partly this demand that has encouraged investors to put their money into biodiesel.
    Investors are planning at least two more plants in Singapore. MAE Engineering, a Singapore company, says it is keen to build a plant on Jurong Island but does not yet have a start date for the construction. Australian company Natural Fuel has ambitions to build a biodiesel plant with a capacity of 400,000 tonnes a year. Its website says the proposed location of its plant is Jurong Island.
    Being close to a source of palm oil is something on which Singapore engineering company Advanced Holdings is banking. It recently secured a licence to start a 100,000 tonnes a year plant in Pahang - a project which joins more than 50 others that Malaysia has approved in the last 18 months.
    Singapore-listed company Wilmar picked Riau, in Indonesia, for a massive plant with an annual production capacity of 1.05 million tonnes. When it is completed next year, Wilmar will be the largest biodiesel producer in the region, if not the world, reckons research house Credit Suisse.
    These plants, along with those planned on Jurong Island, will export biodiesel to Europe and the US.
    So far, there is nothing planned for Singapore vehicles. Clearly, there is no incentive for vehicle owners to switch yet. ComfortDelGro, which operates a fleet of almost 16,000 diesel taxis, says biodiesel is not viable as it will cost more than petroleum-based diesel.
    Ms Elsie Sim, general manager of Shell's sales and operations, says the potential demand in Singapore is negligible. There are 128,000 diesel-run vehicles out of a vehicle population of 600,000. But biodiesel, if used, would make up only 10 per cent of a mixture of biodiesel and fossil diesel. The 10per cent limit is the norm around the world to meet current warranties for vehicles.
    Mr Eric Holthusen, Shell's fuels manager (Asia-Pacific), said biodiesel costs 40 to 60 per cent more to produce than fossil diesel.
    In Europe, tax incentives and legislation have helped drive up demand for biodiesel. Biofuels - a generic term for fuels made from biological sources - have to make up 5 per cent of European Union member countries' transport fuels by 2009, up from 2.75 per cent now.
    It is such European demand that is spurring the biodiesel industry in this region, said Mr Holthusen.
    Although Malaysia has approved dozens of new plants, he pointed out that there was no commercial use for biodiesel there either and that its planned output was headed for Europe too.
    For now, it looks like the cleaner, renewable diesel option may be made here, but will be used elsewhere.
  19. MonsoonMaiden
    Hi, for those interested, I have updated my waterspout entry with a radar image of the thunderstorm producing the waterspout.
    Here is a series of radar images of the squall line that affected the island on 30 April, which our Finnish forecaster was referring to (see my earlier post on 20 May).

    The gust front is quite distinct.

    We had an unusually large number of squall lines on consecutive days this April. April is the transition period between our two monsoons (northeast monsoon and southwest monsoon). We normally get the squall lines during the southwest monsoon period, but we can also get them at other times of the year, whenever our winds change to westerlies/southwesterlies.

    I must apologise for the quality of the radar images - they've been showing a lot of noise/interference. I think we should consider upgrading our radar soon, it's getting on in age ...

  20. MonsoonMaiden
    I was amused by the following email from a gentleman from Finland...he certainly is very enthusiastic - I find meteorology interesting, but I'm not sure I would carry a windmeter around like he does!
    Will post some radar images of the squall line he mentioned when I have the time.
    -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Hello!
    I am a forecaster from Finnish Met. Institute. I got a chance to visit Singapore second time 24-30.4.2007. I traveled with my brother who was also last year visiting Singapore.
    Few reasons I wanted to contact you:
    1) Possibility to visit your forecast office in Changi Airport in the future, 2) weather in Singapore during our stay, 3) special events during our stay
    1) It would be a great honour to visit your forecasting office, maybe during next visit. The place is not best one if considered just after arrival (12-15 hours of flying from Helsinki) with all the luggage and immigration prosedures.
    On the other hand, paying a visit in the middle of the stay would mean to take a cab or MRT to Changi. In fact we traveled from Raffles Place to Changi via MRT.
    Would it be possible to pay a visit? I would contact weeks before time of the visit. I just would be interested of your day-to-day routines, forecasting models, effect of El Nino-La Nina to climate...
    2) Year before (late April 2006) the weather was relatively dry with 3-4 days without any rain. Temperatures were also many times above 30 C.
    This time it was a little different story. We stayed one night longer but still it rained every single day (8 days a row). Temperatures has hard time reach 30 C. Typically it rained during night or in the morning and the cloud deck didn't vanish until the afternoon hours. It must have rained 120-150 mm locally during this period of our stay.
    Does shift from weak El Nino to near neutral in ENSO during December06, January-February07 has an impact?
    3) I would like get little more info of these two events:
    On the nights 29th and 30th (3-4 AM) strong thunderstorm and strong wind keep us awake.
    What triggers strong nightly thunderstorms in Singapore/Malesiya area? Radiation cooling on the top of the cirrus? How many lightning strikes (cloud to ground) strong storms produce usually? I noticed that local people doesn't care a lot even when lightning strikes rumbles very near. Some tall skyscrapers may take few strikes?
    This 30th April nightly event was even more bizzar. Usually in the tropics no strong winds are observed even with thunder.
    Last year I measured with my portable windmeter of 13 m/s gusts from the 28th floor of Swissotel the Stamford. This time we were on the same side (baywye) but on the 51th floor (120-130 m AGL). At 3 AM 30.4.2007 strong haueling wind woke us. It was raining heavily but no thunder was heard. I did not go to balcony because of the lightning risk. The wind was blowing pretty hard about 10-15 min. I would estimate that the gusts were near 15 m/s. We even sceared some clothes drying on the balcony floor could lift up. Of course our position was over 100 m above sea level, but I think there was strong gusts even on the ground level.
    What was behind this event? Downdrafts? How strong can winds be in strong thunderstorms?
    Ps. In our opinion Singapore is by far the best country we have visited. Clean, hospitality and everything. Growing traffic and Casinos built may be some conserns in the future.
    XXX
    forecaster, Finnish Meteorological Institute
    Helsinki, Finland
  21. MonsoonMaiden
    "Sun Sad" by Mike Muk
    The smoke haze is back in Singapore. It made front page news in the local newspapers & was reported in Channel News Asia as well. Quite a number of people also sent hazy photos to the Stomp website. The National Environment Agency (of which Met Services Division is a part) has also posted a haze update on its website.

    For the haze to be such a newsworthy item actually speaks well for our usual air quality - in some large cities, smog prevails every day & such atmospheric conditions are the norm, & would not cause even the slightest of hiccups in the local news.
  22. MonsoonMaiden

    Random Snippets

    By MonsoonMaiden,

    THE ASMC
    A few days after I started work, I discovered that MSS was hosting a research centre called the ASMC (ASEAN Specialised Meteorological Centre). At that time there were three scientists attached there, Dr Rosa Perez from PAGASA (the Philippines' Met. Office) and Tukul Rameyo Adi & Suratno from BMG, Indonesia. Adi and Suratno were not exactly meteorologists but doing some technical work for BMG. Adi once showed me his wedding photo & I couldn't help laughing because although he looked very nice in his Javanese costume, he had this glassy-eyed expression of disbelief on his face.
    When Rosa's stint ended, she said before leaving, "We shall meet again. Meteorology is a small world." This turned out to be true, because I met her some years later in Manila (she seemed to have forgotten me by then, though! :lol: ) Adi also reappeared in our office a couple of years later when he returned for a training workshop. It was nice seeing him again, with his sheepish grin.
    The next two ASMC scientists I met were also from PAGASA : Jun & Bubut. I was quite puzzled by their names at first, until I discovered that Jun's real name was Landrico Dalida Jr and that "Jun" was short for "Junior". Bubut (pronounced Boo-Boot) kept insisting her real name was Bubut until someone else told me it was Fredolina Baldonando.
    There have been several other ASMC scientists, including a pretty woman meteorologist from Vietnam, but I didn't get to see them much as they seldom came over to the Operations office.
    EDMUND
    On my first day at work, the Deputy Director noticed that the desk I was using in the library was dusty, so he went off & reappeared with an elderly technician by the name of Edmund, & told him to clean the desk. I felt pretty embarrassed; it's not as if I can't clean my own desk. Anyway I got to chatting with Edmund; he was a wily & intelligent character, & since I was stuck alone in the library for those first few months (while waiting to go to Reading), he was more or less the first friend I had in MSS.
    He said his official title was Port Met. Officer, but that this was just a glorified term for the technician who visits the ships that carry our met. equipment. (There are a number of ships that have agreed to carry our met. equipment & collect weather data, & it was Edmund's job to visit them when they came to port in order to collect the data sheets & replace equipment parts when necessary). Edmund would pop by the library sometimes & feed me various bits of gossip about the office; & although there were a lot of things about MSS that he didn't seem happy with, still I noticed he took a lot of pride in doing his job well. Besides collecting ship data, it was also his duty to look through the newspapers every day & cut out all articles related to weather & file them away. He was so meticulous about this that he looked through everything, even the sports section, & if there was even one line mentioning weather (eg that it drizzled during a football match) he would cut the entire article out.
    It was Edmund who arranged that Pat & I visit the Changi observing station & also our Upper Air Laboratory at Paya Lebar where the balloon carrying the radiosonde was released. He also arranged for me to accompany him during one of his ship visits. It was interesting - once you enter the container terminal, it's like entering a different world. There are none of the usual road markings & it seemed to me that the vehicles there were simply driving wherever they wanted. The vehicles were enormous (they had to be, in order to transport the containers) & I was quite terrified that one of these monsters would collide with us & crush Edmund's car to a pulp. (I could just imagine the car crumpling up like a piece of paper). The ship seemed enormous too & it was scary climbing the rope ladder up & the climb seemed to take forever. Edmund, in his usual glib manner, informed me that the sailors on board probably hadn't seen a woman for weeks & would be leering at me. However, everyone was very polite while we were there & we collected the data & left without me noticing any leering.
    The only time I was ever unhappy with Edmund was when he made me sell T-shirts for him to raise funds for his church & didn't bother to sell any himself. I was quite indignant when I found out I was doing all the work for him! Other than that he has been a good friend & I always enjoyed getting updates from him about his wife & kids & listening to all his stories. I think he could have done better than work at MSS. He said if he were younger & had the capital he'd like to open a restaurant. He speaks well & auditioned to be a DJ once. He seemed interested in everything & once amused me by telling me he reads everything, even the labels on cans. I sometimes think I could take a leaf out of his book. :lol:
    SCIENCE CENTRE BOOKLETS

    The Singapore Science Centre has published a series of little guide books which I like a lot, on nearly every aspect of Singapore's flora and fauna - wayside trees, birds, sealife, & flowers, to name a few. Some years ago they wanted to have one on the weather of Singapore as well, & asked MSS to help write it. Unfortunately, the project fell through due to lack of funding. I really felt it was a pity, it would be nice if we could have our own weather pocket guide book at last.
  23. MonsoonMaiden
    Singaporeans experienced two rounds of tremors in the space of two hours on Tuesday, following two earthquakes in Padang, Indonesia.
    Singapore's Meteorological Services Division said the first tremors were felt at about 11.50am after an earthquake measuring 6.6 on the Richter scale struck Padang on the island of Sumatra.
    The epicentre was 50 kilometres north-northeast of Padang and some 430 kilometres south-west of Singapore.
    The second round of tremors occurred around 1.50pm after another earthquake, also measuring 6.6 on the Richter scale, struck Padang.
    The Police and the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) received nearly 1,000 calls from the public reporting tremors after the two quakes.
    The tremors were felt in many parts of Singapore and in some 236 buildings.
    Most of the buildings were in Ang Mo Kio, Yishun, Toa Payoh, Woodlands, Serangoon, Sengkang and CBD areas like Robinson Road and Shenton Way.
    Callers to the MediaCorp News Hotline reported tremors were also felt at Beach Road and Choa Chu Kang.
    Of those affected, 131 were HDB buildings, 95 commercial buildings and 10 private residences.
    Witnesses said some tall buildings in the central business district swayed slightly.
    Several buildings, like the Concourse, Capital Square and Centennial Tower in the city, and even Ngee Ann Polytechnic in Clementi, were evacuated.
    Police said there were no reports of injuries from the tremors in Singapore.
    Office worker Nicholas Wong said he and his colleagues were at their office shortly before lunchtime when they felt the building shaking.
    "We grabbed our bags and just evacuated," he told 93.8 Live radio station.
    "Everyone was panicking. One of my colleagues was crying because she had never felt such an effect before. We were all rushing out of the building."
    But public relations executive Gavin Liow, 23, said he and his colleagues took it calmly.
    "I thought, what the hell was it? You don't expect such things to happen," he told AFP.
    Danny Tan Ming Xiong, 24, said he and his colleagues also felt the tremors.
    "We were kind of freaked (the) first time. My colleagues and I thought we were giddy. Everyone started asking each other if we felt it, then realised the building was shaking," he told AFP.
    "My company made the decision to get out of the building. We went down 40 storeys by stairs."
    A spokesman for Saint Andrews Junior College said the first tremor disrupted lessons and students were dismissed after the second one "to pre-empt further interruptions, and in the students' interests and safety."
    Another office worker told Channel NewsAsia he saw people screaming as they went out.
    Others felt no tremors at all but got swept along by the general reaction.
    "I didn't feel anything when one of my colleagues called me to evacuate," said South African Bulelwa Makina, 24.
    "This is my first time feeling a tremor in Singapore but because I have been here for a while, I do know that Singapore does get tremors from other countries so I wasn't shocked," she told AFP.
    - CNA/ir
  24. MonsoonMaiden
    Besides doing civilian work at Changi Airport, we also have forecasters stationed at military airbases around the island. There was a shortage of manpower at one time, so several of the Changi forecasters had to cover duty there, including me.
    The work consisted mainly of monitoring the weather and issuing a warning if a thunderstorm was going to affect the airbase. It was a good experience because I did a lot more outdoor observation there than I did at Changi. In Changi, we were issuing warnings for locations far from the airport, so we had to rely mostly on the radar. At the airbases, we spent a lot more time peering at the sky & watching the clouds develop.
    The first airbase I went to was Tengah. It was large and sprawling, and many of the buildings were old, including the Met. Office, which was situated below the control tower overlooking the runway. It was a small office, & the forecaster's room was a claustrophobic little cell with no windows except for a small square of glass in the door. The radar display was housed in an adjoining room, where the aircon was so cold that temperatures seemed to reach arctic levels. Every time the phone rang, I would dash to the radar room to have a look first before running back to answer, in case it was the control tower calling for an update. The other disadvantage was that we were surrounded on three sides by trees, so that the only unimpeded view of the sky we had was westward over the runway. This meant that the control tower ironically had a much better view of the clouds developing than we did.
    Tengah had the most peculiar work hours I have seen. They were something like this :
    Mon 0730-1330hrs
    Tue 0730-2130hrs
    Wed 1330-2130hrs
    Thur Rest day
    Fri 0730-1815hrs
    Sat Rest day
    Sun Standby
    There were two other forecasters there, an Indian gentleman called KT, and also Dr CT, who had done his PhD in Japan. Both have since retired. Dr CT was a short & bespectacled man with a loud voice whom everyone affectionately referred to as "Doctor". He was simple & good-natured, & the NS boys loved teasing him (Actually they should be called National Servicemen, but they were only about 17 or 18 yrs of age. National Service is compulsory in Singapore).
    The head technician there was Mr Y, & I liked hearing about his treks in Nepal & various stories about the airbase. I remember him telling me that there used to be a cobra living in a hole in the ground near the Stevenson screen; it was quite bold, & used to come outside in the mornings to sunbathe.
    I once got into trouble with KT because I was experimenting with some animated cursors on the PC (it being a fair day so I had some free time). I tried out this little walking dinosaur & forgot to reinstall the old arrow cursor before I went home.

    The thing about the dinosaur cursor is that the cursor tip is the tip of the tail, but Mr KT didn't know that. The following day I got a lecture from him & was told not to change the settings in the PC in the future. When he'd left, Mr Y, shaking with laughter, told me that KT had become very agitated the day before when he'd discovered the arrow cursor had suddenly turned into a walking dinosaur. He couldn't select anything on the PC screen, & called Y for help. It took them a while to figure out how to get the arrow cursor back.
    We had to give a weather briefing to all the squadrons every week, & Doctor carefully told me what to do. I must open with "Good morning, Base Commander, Deputy Commander, ladies and gentlemen". The trouble is, I didn't know what the Base Commander looked like. The hall is huge, all the squadrons are present, & I'm up there on the stage looking at them from a distance. I had no idea whether the Base Commander was there or not. He sometimes wasn't present & the Deputy would take over instead. I usually solved the problem by only saying "Good morning, ladies and gentlemen."
    I discovered that this wouldn't do, though. No formal complaint was made, but the message got passed down verbally that it wasn't correct protocol. My reasoning was that it would be ridiculous if I greeted the Base Commander when he wasn't present. Fortunately I was only at the airbase temporarily, & I was a civilian & not in the employ of Ministry of Defence, or I guess I would have been demoted.
    Another peculiar procedure everyone had to do was F.O.D. - Foreign Object Detection. When driving in to the control tower it is necessary to cross the runway at one point, & there was an occasion when some debris got sucked into the engine of one of the aircraft. Whether the debris came from the tyres of a vehicle or not, from then on everyone had to stop their car, get out & examine their tyres before proceeding onto the runway. As a result, on approaching the runway one could often see several cars parked there, with their occupants crouched in various positions next to them.
    It took me a while to get used to working at Tengah, especially having to listen to the deafening screech of F16s all day long. Despite the noise I did like watching them, in particular the takeoff and landing. I don't know why but there's always something magical about watching an airplane take flight. I enjoyed watching them practising for NDP as well, flying in formation. One morning I was also lucky enough to catch a parachute jump taking place overhead; it was a nice sight, all the little brightly coloured parachutes in the sky.
    But the best times were in the evenings, when flying had ended for the day. Then a silence descended on the airbase, & it was very pleasant to stand outside & watch the sun set over the runway. This is one of the few places in Singapore where there are no buildings in view, only trees. There was usually a gentle breeze blowing, and a small flock of white birds swirling around in the distance, egrets perhaps. It was a very restful scene.

  25. MonsoonMaiden

    Haze Update

    By MonsoonMaiden,

    Satellite pictures yesterday clearly showed the haze wafting in from Kalimantan.


    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    ChannelNewsAsia has devoted an entire section to the haze. One viewer sent in this rather nice photo of the moon :

    The haze gave last night's moon an atmospheric orange cast as seen here beside one of the office buildings in the CBD. – Photo from Stuart Clyne
    Meanwhile, the problems looks no closer to being solved. Bother these politicians.
    The Straits Times
    Oct 17, 2006
    Indonesians close ranks
    By Indonesia Bureau Chief, Azhar Ghani
    JAKARTA - AS EXTERNAL pressure mounts on Indonesia to deal with the haze caused by land-clearing fires, local critics appear to have closed ranks behind the flag. Observers say the turning point seems to have been President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's apology last Wednesday to Singapore and Malaysia for the recurring problem.
    Many critics have now fallen back on nationalist arguments, alleging that countries complaining about the haze have also been found wanting when it comes to cross-border issues. The local media, which had earlier lambasted the government for not doing enough to stop the haze from spreading, has shifted its focus to how Jakarta is doing its best to solve the problem.
    Observers also note how major dailies are persisting in apportioning some of the blame to Malaysia - allegedly a big buyer of illegal timber from Indonesia - even though State Minister for the Environment Rachmat Witoelar has said that most of the culprits are suspected to be Indonesians.
    While there is little new about accusations against Malaysia, Singapore is also now in the dock. Editorials in two dailies say that Singapore expects Indonesia to act fast when something affects the Republic adversely, but dithers when the positions are reversed.
    Last Thursday, business daily Bisnis Indonesia's editorial dwelt on the letter that Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong had sent Dr Yudhoyono to express his disappointment over the issue. Mr Lee had said that Indonesia's handling of the haze problem could have an effect on investor confidence in the country and on Asean's credibility.
    While the editorial acknowledged that Indonesia was in the wrong and suggested that help from others should be accepted, it also said Mr Lee was effectively dictating what Indonesia should be doing. It added that Singapore was not ready to sign an extradition treaty with Indonesia and that the Republic also harboured suspects in corruption cases wanted by Jakarta. Indonesia has, for nearly a decade, been seeking an extradition treaty with Singapore. The prevailing view in Indonesia is that corrupt businessmen and politicians usually hide - and park their assets - in Singapore.
    Sunday's editorial in the daily Koran Tempo took a similar line, and suggested that there was nothing wrong in linking the two issues. It said: 'If Singapore says it had no intention of inviting rich Indonesians, especially those with ill-gotten gains, to its shores, we can also say that we did not intend to send the haze there. Blame it on the wind. Yes, this may be childish diplomacy, but who knows, it might just work.'
    And Sunday also saw Vice-President Jusuf Kalla saying that countries complaining about the haze should think about the oxygen that Indonesia's forests produce.
    International relations analyst Bantarto Bandoro felt that Jakarta's defensive posture was understandable but said that it did not mean the real problem had been forgotten. He said: 'Indonesians will not lose sight of the real issue and won't hold back if they still see that the government has not done much to improve a situation that has made Indonesia look bad.''
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