John Wheeler

4 weeks ago | inforum.com | John Wheeler

FARGO — In the 1980s, when this meteorologist was a college student and then a young professional, it was my twice daily task to copy the coded weather station observations onto a map and then draw the isobars, isotherms, isopleths and other contour lines for weather analysis. My first effort took about three hours; but after a few months, I could easily plot and analyze a weather map of the Northern Plains and Upper Midwest in less than half an hour. It became a pleasure to draw those lines.

4 weeks ago | inforum.com | John Wheeler

FARGO — During spring and summer — in the absence of a shower, thunderstorm, cold front or some other sort of disturbance in the atmosphere — the air will often become wonderfully calm right around sunset. This happens because of a cooling of the air in the lowest 200 to 300 feet of the atmosphere. During a sunny afternoon, the ground gets very hot, heating air in this lowest layer of the atmosphere.

1 month ago | inforum.com | John Wheeler

FARGO — Frost in May is a fairly typical and nearly annual occurrence. However, a string of freezing nights along with scattered areas of snow is a little less typical. Still, it is not unprecedented. The Fargo Moorhead weather record from 1907 indicates 16 of the 31 nights during May were freezing. Eight nights were 25 degrees or colder. It snowed four separate times during the month, including a 2.9" snowfall May 13-14.

1 month ago | siouxfallslive.com | John Wheeler

FARGO — Widespread drought across much of North America, particularly in the Northern Plains and Upper Midwest, during the summers of 1988 and 1989 was, perhaps, the worst weather disaster of the last 50 years. Thousands of heat-related deaths were associated with the drought, as well as damages exceeding $60 billion ($160 billion in 2025 dollars). It was the worst drought since the 1930s. The cause of the drought is still not entirely known.

1 month ago | inforum.com | John Wheeler

FARGO — Around 1,300 tornadoes, on average, touch down somewhere in the United States per year. Around 60 deaths per year, on average, are caused by these 1,300 tornadoes, meaning there is fewer than one death for every 20 tornadoes. The most common EF0 (wind speed 65-85 mph) and EF1 (wind speed 86-110 mph) tornadoes rarely result in fatalities.