Let’s see, if we don’t catch COVID-19 and become very sick or die, there is the risk our equipment and home can be destroyed by lightning or burned by forest fire. Yup, the dog days of summer 2020.
Last night (August 16, 2020) was a case in point. It was really fun (not) to be awakened by the crash of thunder, and realize that my antennas were still connected to the radios inside my house. Quick on the draw, as I am, I was outside and manually disconnecting feedlines from my window passthrough while lightning was flashing in the sky. 🙁
Well, it turns out I was lucky, and neither my equipment or I was hurt.
In retrospect, I have grown complacent during this time of multiple hazards. I had made a rule to myself that I would disconnect my feedlines from the house during lightning season, but I stopped doing it. Logically, I took the position that night time thunderstorms were not very common on Vancouver Island. Therefore, looking at the forecast tools I have access to, a quick analysis before bedtime and I made a bad decision not to disconnect my equipment.
To make a long story short, I’ve been surprised twice this summer, i.e. lightning after dark resulting in panicked disconnect sessions during a thunderstorm. …
So, here we are in mid August, an interesting summer. The forest fire risk is high to extreme. Overnight, a bunch of new, lightning caused, forest fires started up on South-East Vancouver Island and COVID-19 infection rates are near the previous peak of March/April 2020.
To help you, the reader, fulfill your anxiety dreams, I thought I’d present you with a number of ‘Dashboards’ to feed your obsessions. Given the three big risks are (1) COVID-19, (2) forest fires, and (3) Lightning, I’d like to present one website for each that will keep you up to date.
(1) Government of BC COVID-19 Dashboard.
The Government of BC COVID-19 dashboard is exactly what it appears to be: a one-stop source of current COVID-19 infection and test data. Note: while updated daily by 5:00pm local time, the dashboard is not updated on the weekend. Therefore, Monday’s numbers reflects the sum total of three days (SAT-SUN-MON).
Like the BC COVID-19 dashboard, this dashboard is very intuitive, although the image you’re looking at was scaled to focus on Vancouver Island. When you first open the dashboard, it will scale to image the entire province of BC. After using your mouse to click on (select) the map, use your mouse wheel to rescale to your desired location and size.
This map is updated multiple times daily. New fires are displayed with a yellow-orange quadrangle, fires out of control are red, under control are a green circle.
(3) map.blitzortung.org – Live Lightning Map
I’ve presented this map before. It’s my personal go-t0 for lightning awareness. As well as the above links link, an IOS app is available from the Apple App Store. The beauty of the IOS app is it’s ability to set distance based lightning strike alarms. Trust me, the alarms are fast, the thunder from nearby strikes is faster.
Surprisingly, I did check the live lightning map before bedtime last night. While I did notice three lightning strikes, about twenty miles west of Neah Bay, over open water, I assumed they would die out before landfall. Stupid me!!
Given my meteorological background, I should have known better. Thunderstorms over the open water are usually due to a little more than daytime heating. If I’d taken the time to look, I would have seen a small energy pulse moving south to north. Regardless, I was complacent and got caught. Thankfully, no damage.
So, there you are. Three ways to monitor the drama surrounding the summer of 2020.
VE7RQX Ron