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White Out
Wed Feb 02, 2005
Listen in RealAudio 
As we get into the wintry season, we at The Weather Notebook thought it might be time
to look at some of the terminology of this cold part of the year. Hi, I'm Bryan Yeaton for
The Weather Notebook.
Blizzard. We all probably can form a pretty good picture of what it's all about, but what,
EXACTLY, is it? The word comes to us from, well, we really aren't sure where it comes
from, according to Webster's Dictionary. However, the Glossary of Weather and
Climate suggests that the name originated in Virginia, and spread throughout the
land.
The National Weather Service constitutes a blizzard as a storm with at least 35 mph
winds -- just below gale-force -- enduring for more than three hours, accompanied by
low temperatures, and visibility below a quarter of a mile due to the
snow.
A whiteout is even more confusing. We normally envision a whiteout as a severe
blizzard, where visibility is so bad that any sense of direction is lost. You may have
heard stories of people lost when they normally would have been in sight of safe
haven. On Mount Washington, a snow tractor operator once stepped a few yards away
from his machine ... and never found it again. His passengers were perplexed -- and
quite frightened, to be stranded high up on one of the most brutal mountains on
earth.
The driver eventually found his way down the mountain, meeting the rescue teams
which were coming to find him, and the passengers were rescued several hours
later.
A whiteout, however, is also an atmospheric condition of polar regions, where the
snow cover, the overcast sky, and the air itself become indistinguishable. With no
horizon, objects seem to float in the air.
The Weather Notebook is supported by Subaru of America, and the National Science
Foundation. We are produced at the Mount Washington Observatory, where our
website is www.mountwashington.org.
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