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AccuWeather School Spring Semester: Weeks 4-7

By Kristina Pydynowski, AccuWeather senior meteorologist

Updated May 2, 2021 1:39 PM EDT

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🏥 March 5 - First aid class: Important ice fishing safety tips

Ice fishing can be a fun and relaxing winter activity, but there are safety tips you must follow. The most important ones are making sure the ice is thick enough and that you stay warm to protect against hypothermia:

AccuWeather Meteorologist Brandon Buckingham told us the difference between clear and gray ice, so how much clear ice is considered safe to be out on the ice?

“Always look for at least 4 inches (10 cm) of good clear ice in order for people to safely walk on,” Brandon said. He recommends at least 6 inches (15 cm) of clear ice to bring an ATV or snowmobile out on the ice, and at least a foot (30 cm) of clear ice to drive a car or small pick-up out on the ice.

“In all cases, though, the more ice, the better,” Brandon added.

If you are ever unsure about the ice thickness, you should never venture out onto the ice. Two more things to keep in mind – ice can change across a body of water and ice is never 100 percent safe!

“If there are any flowing bodies of water (creeks or rivers) that discharge into the lake or pond, these may be areas you want to avoid because of unsafe ice conditions,” Brandon said. “Moving water will take longer to freeze, and the ice may be thinner than surrounding areas of the lake.”

🏕️ March 5 - Field Trip: Last ice fishing trip of the winter!

It’s time for a field trip at AccuWeather School – this time, we are joining AccuWeather Meteorologist Brandon Buckingham on one of his last ice fishing trips of the winter in central Pennsylvania.

You may think that ice anglers want a day with bright sunshine and calm winds to lessen the chill when they are sitting out in the cold waiting patiently for the fish to bite. However, Brandon said that ice fishing tends to be slower on days when high pressure is overhead.

The better days for fishing is when a storm is approaching or overhead (meaning the air pressure is lower). Brandon and other ice fishers will just bundle up more on these cloudy days!

Regardless of the weather, Brandon reminds anyone new to ice fishing to make sure you know and follow the set of rules specific to your area – such as how many rods you are legally allowed to use, how many fish you can keep and if you need a fishing license.

🌎 March 2 - History Class: What has caused both snow in Miami and spawned tornadoes?

Let’s start AccuWeather School with a history lesson – it has snowed in Miami! Back on Jan. 19, 1977, snow was seen in South Florida for the first time in recorded history. There wasn’t enough snow to make a snowman in Miami, but just seeing snowflakes flying in this typically warm city was quite a treat to kids!

Why are we talking about snow in Miami in today’s lesson? To show you the power of cold fronts. A cold front marks the leading edge of colder air marching into an area. Cold fronts are why you may be wearing shorts one day but need a jacket the next.

In the winter, cold fronts can open the door for bitterly cold air from the North Pole to plunge southward – that’s how snow fell in Miami in 1977 and why it has snowed in some deserts in the past.

Cold fronts also show how powerful they are in warmer months by spawning tornadoes. Since cold air is more dense than warm air, the colder air marching in with a cold front will lift the warmer air up and away – that’s one of the key ingredients for a tornado to form.

📚 March 2 - Study Hall: Snizzle? That’s an actual weather term!

Snizzle is a funny-sounding word, but it is actually a weather term used by meteorologists. It is made up of two other weather words – find out if you guessed the correct two and how they can happen at the same time:

Snizzle is a portmanteau, or a combination of two words – in this case, light snow and drizzle. But you need to take it seriously when it is in the forecast. With temperatures below freezing, the drizzle part of snizzle can make roads and sidewalks very slippery.

You may laugh when you hear snizzle, but it can cause dangers to you and your family. That’s why many meteorologists (including us at AccuWeather) don’t use the term often. Instead, your forecast will read a mixture of freezing drizzle and flurries, and watch for icy spots.

But now you know what snizzle means in case you hear someone say it!

🔬 Feb. 26 - Weather Lab: Why fire won’t melt snow

Did you see some videos of people questioning whether snow was actually on the ground since a flame wasn’t causing the snow to melt into a puddle of water?

It wasn’t fake snow on the ground – as AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Jason Nicholls shows us, it’s science in action!

While the snowball won’t melt into water, it will keep shrinking as the heat from the flame causes the snow to – big word time – sublimate. That means that the snow goes from a solid (in this case snow) to a gas (water vapor).

If you still have snow on the ground where you live and want to try this at home, just make sure you have an adult to help you out!

🦅 Feb. 26 - Bird Watching: Why don’t birds’ feet freeze in the winter?

You know not to run around barefoot on snow or you will get frostbite, but why can birds such as ducks and geese walk on snow and even swim in freezing cold water without needing shoes?

The answer is that they have a very unique circulation system:

Thanks to the Cornell Lab for helping to teach us about birds’ countercurrent heat exchange system – can you imagine your fingers and toes being close to freezing as the rest of your body is nice and warm? You would give someone a shiver just by touching them!

Speaking of shivering, that’s another way birds stay warm in the winter. They will also pack on body weight, fluff their feathers and cuddle, according to our friends at the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.

Have you ever seen birds stand on one leg in the snow? They aren’t just trying to impress you; they are trying to keep their heat locked in – much like how you may wrap your arms around your body to stay warm instead of walking down the street with your arms spread out.

🌎 Feb. 23 - History Class: Coldest ever on Earth happened in the summer?

Following all of the news about the deadly and unusual cold in the United States last week, we are going to start history class with a pop-quiz – what is the all-time lowest temperature ever recorded on Earth?

Vostok, Antarctica, holds that record with a low of 128.6 degrees below zero Fahrenheit (89.2 degrees below zero Celsius). 

Next question on the pop-quiz – what month did this happen?

If you guessed July, you get a gold star! But wait a minute, July is a summer month. For all of our students in the Northern Hemisphere, don’t forget that it’s winter in July in the Summer Hemisphere, where Antarctica is located.

Polar circle boat heading towards Esperanza, an Argentinian base on Antarctica. (brytta / iStock / Getty Images Plus)

Today’s pop-quiz isn’t done – why doesn’t the North Pole hold this record?

Water keeps temperatures from dropping as much as over land – and what is the key difference between the North Pole and the South Pole? There is more water around the Arctic Circle, while Antarctica is a continent – that’s why Antarctica got the prize for the coldest spot ever on Earth on July 21, 1983.

⛹️‍♂️ Feb. 23 - Gym class: Time to freeze bubbles

If you love blowing bubbles, here’s something fun to do when it is really cold outside – create frozen bubbles! You just definitely have to bundle up since the best time to freeze bubbles is when temperatures are in the single digits or below zero Fahrenheit (under 13 below zero Celsius):

Have you run out of regular bubble solution since last summer? No problem! Mix one part water, four parts dish soap and a dash of light corn syrup to make your own homemade bubbles.

(raigna/iStock/Thinkstock)

📝 Feb. 19 - Pop quiz! Why is the sky blue?

When you’ve had to draw a pretty picture with the sky in the background during art class, what color do you make the sky? Blue – everyone knows that. But why is the sky blue?

When light from the sun enters Earth’s atmosphere, it bumps into the tiny atoms and molecules of the gases that make up the air. When that happens, all the colors of the rainbow are scattered out of the light. Each color (or wavelength) travels to our eyes differently and that determines who wins the race to color the sky.

A flashlight can help us understand wavelength and how we see colors:

  • Flashlight shining right in your face (short wavelength) = you have to turn away from the bright light

  • Flashlight shining on your face from the other side of the room (long wavelength) = you can see the light, but it is not as bright.

Red has the longest wavelength – you can see it from farther away than any other color, and that’s why it’s better to have this color to tell us to stop. However, red doesn’t have the power of blue, which has a shorter wavelength and gets the prize for being the color of the sky.

🎨 Feb. 19 - Art Class: Create your own snow volcano

You may have made a volcano for a school project before, but it’s even better when you can build a volcano out of snow! 

All you need for this fun activity is a small plastic cup or jar, two spoonfuls of baking soda, some dishwashing liquid, a few drops of food coloring and about two tablespoons of vinegar, and these instructions by AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Jason Nicholls:

Did you know that most powerful volcanoes (the real ones, not our snow volcanoes!) can affect weather across the world? Even though volcanoes spew hot lava, big eruptions can cause the Earth to cool.

The small ash and other particles shot up high into the air by volcanoes can prevent some of the sun’s rays from reaching Earth’s surface – a blanket of clouds will do the same thing, but only for usually a few days at a time. We can notice cooler air due to volcanic ash for 1 to 3 years after a major eruption, according to AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Brett Anderson.

The bigger the volcano eruption and closer to the equator, the higher the chance for the whole globe to notice it’s cooler than normal. But again, it takes a really powerful volcano to change Earth’s weather.

For all the kids reading this, you weren’t born the last time a big volcano made the Earth cooler – that happened in 1991 with the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines.

Mount St. Helens in Washington spews smoke, soot and ash into the sky in April 1980. (AP Photo/Jack Smith)

⚡ Feb. 16 - Shocking Truth: A bomb cyclone doesn’t involve TNT

If you haven’t heard it before, the phrase “bomb cyclone” is an actual weather term. While no explosives are involved in the creation of a bomb cyclone, explosive storm strengthening is very much a part of this weather phenomenon.

Bomb cyclone is a common phrase for a process known as bombogenesis, which comes from combining two words: bomb and cyclogenesis. “All storms are cyclones, and genesis means the creation or beginning,” AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Alex Sosnowski explains. “In this case, ‘bomb’ refers to explosive development.”

The heavy, windswept snow produced by bomb cyclones in the winter can cause dangerous travel and major disruptions. However, these are the storms that many kids dream of for one or more snow days and ample opportunity to go sledding, build forts and other fun snow activities.

A satellite image showing the record 'bomb cyclone' making its final approach late Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2019, along the west coast of the U.S. (NOAA)

Parents and teachers will remember the Superstorm of 1993 (also known as the Storm of the Century), which was a prime example of a bomb cyclone.

⛹️‍♂️ Feb. 16 - Gym class: When will this massive snow pile finally melt?

It’s been two months since we started watching this massive snow pile in State College, Pennsylvania, wondering when it would fully melt. It actually has grown since we last looked at it!

While it shouldn’t surprise us that the snow pile got bigger from December to February – it is winter after all! Actually, did you know that it is already spring? It is when we are talking about solar spring. Meteorological spring starts on March 1, followed by astronomical spring on March 20.

Since there will soon be more days when the snow pile melts than days when more snow is added to it, when do you think this snow pile will finally be gone? Submit your guesses through Facebook or Twitter. Use the hashtag #AccuWeatherSchool to get credit! You can get a hint by looking at the long-range AccuWeather forecast.

🌎 Feb. 12 - History Class: Meteorologists focus on weather, not meteors

A person who studies the weather is officially called a meteorologist. It is a tricky word since meteorology starts with meteor, so you may think that is what a meteorologist focuses each day. So why the confusion? Let’s dive a little deeper.

Much like how George Washington was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, Aristotle from ancient Greece is thought to be one of the founding fathers of meteorology. He wrote the first weather book, Meteorologica, way back around 340 BC.

The book’s title came from the Greek word that means lofty or in the air, which would refer to meteors, clouds, rain or snow. As time went on, astronomers took on the job of studying meteors and meteorologists focused on the weather. Maybe if it worked out the other way, all of us at AccuWeather would be called weatherologists!

⛹️‍♂️ Feb. 12 - Gym class: Time for a snowfall fight!

It’s snowing and you call up your friend to play outside – you go to have a snowfall fight, but the snowball falls apart. What happened? It’s never too cold for snow to fall, but it can be too cold for a snowball fight:

A wet snow is the best to pack snowballs, but want to make sure your gloves don’t get soaked – your fingers will get really cold and you may get frostbite!

🎨 Feb. 9 - Art Class: Making snowflakes at home

It’s time to show off your artistic side by making snowflakes at home! All you need for this activity is construction paper, cotton balls and glue.

The snowflake that you just created with Krissy is called a dendrite snowflake. If you copied exactly how Krissy made her snowflake, yours and hers snowflakes would likely be the only two identical dendrite snowflakes ever made!

Ice crystals bump into one another and just a hair difference in temperature and moisture cause them to grow into different snowflakes before reaching the ground – even if they are right next to one another. That’s why it is very unlikely to find two snowflakes that are exactly alike!

🔬 Feb. 9 -  Weather Lab: How the perfect snowflake is made

When you think of a snowflake, do these images come to mind:

Snowflake
Twitter

These are called dendrite snowflakes – and they definitely show how artistic Mother Nature can be!

Just because it is snowing, doesn’t mean that you will always see these types of snowflakes. It all depends on temperatures way above our heads.

Remember when we talked about the water cycle – how water evaporates from the ground, and that water vapor cools and condenses into clouds. During the winter, water vapor within the cloud will also condense onto tiny pieces of dust or dirt, and an ice crystal will start to form – that’s the seed of the snowflake that lands on you!

Back to the temperature – the temperature needs to be between 0 and 10 degrees Fahrenheit (18 below zero to 12 below zero Celsius) within the cloud for these dendrite snowflakes to form.

Check out this video below and see how different these snowflakes look:

These are called needle snowflakes – don’t they look like needles at a doctor’s office or in a sewing kit. Needle snowflakes form when temperatures in the cloud are closer to 23 degrees Fahrenheit (5 below zero Celsius).

No matter what type of snowflake falls, you just want enough snow to close school and be able to play in, right??

Additional experiments and reporting by Jason Nicholls.

Previously:

AccuWeather School Spring Semester: Weeks 1-3

AccuWeather School Winter Break

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Weeks 14-15

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Weeks 12-13

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Weeks 10-11

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Weeks 8-9

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Weeks 6-7

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Weeks 4-5

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Weeks 2-3

AccuWeather School Fall Semester: Week 1

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 13

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 12

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 11

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 10

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 9

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 8

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 7

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 6

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 5

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 4

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 3

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 2

AccuWeather Summer Camp: Week 1

AccuWeather School: Week 1

AccuWeather School: Week 2

AccuWeather School: Week 3

AccuWeather School: Week 4

AccuWeather School: Week 5

AccuWeather School: Week 6

AccuWeather School: Week 7

AccuWeather School: Week 8

AccuWeather School: Week 9

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