WX Factor « WJAC-TV Weather Blog

Coldest NFL Games in History

By Tim Tender on January 23rd, 2011 at 5:01 PM

Lambeau Field in Green Bay - Coldest NFL Game Ever!

My trivia question tonight had to do with the coldest NFL game ever played in Pittsburgh. The exact question was “How cold was the coldest NFL game ever played in Pittsburgh?” and the answer was, surprisingly, only 11 degrees. I thought it might have been colder.

In doing my research for the question, I looked online and found an article on Forbes.com outlining the coldest games in NFL history. The research may not be 100% perfect, but it shows a good representation of some of the coldest games. Take a look inside this post to see the top 5. (Read More)

Rain, Warm Temps Threaten Winter Classic

By Tim Tender on December 27th, 2010 at 10:56 AM

Winter Classic – Pens vs. Caps

It isn’t typical for Pittsburgh to have temperatures in the 50s for January 1st.� As a matter of fact, the normal high temperature for Pittsburgh for that date is 36° and the record high is 69° set all the way back in 1876!� This kind of weather [...]

1,000 Posts Later

By Tim Tender on June 27th, 2010 at 8:44 PM

It’s hard to beleive that we’ve posted 1,000 stories on the weather blog. We started with a page on the main WJACTV.com website. That didn’t have enough adaptability, so we moved to Blogger and later to WordPress. We’ve been on WordPress for a while now.

This is officially our 1,000th post according to the stats system that we use. I have a feeling that we hit 1,000 a while ago, but this is a great opportunity to look back and see some of the cooler topics we’ve talked about over the last 3 years.

Below the jump is a list of 13 categories with some of the cooler topics. You can click on the category to go to a list of the posts about that topic. Click in for the list. (Read More)

WX Factor: Improving Your Golf Game

By Tim Tender on May 16th, 2010 at 9:09 PM

Weather Affects Golf

Are you like me? Does your golf game need a little (or a lot) of work? Well, if you go out to the course at the right time, you can get a little help from Mother Nature.

So, what are the best conditions to help your drive?

First off, you need the wind in your favor. That is probably the best influence. The only problem is that because of the way the course is put together, you’ll have the wind with you and the wind against you at different points of your round.

The wind aside, the most important part of your game, weather-wise, is the density of the air. The denser the air, the less your ball will travel. To get conditions like this, the following needs to come together…

Hot temperatures
High Humidity
Low Pressure

Why does high humidity make the air less dense? That seems counter-intuitive. Believe it or not, water vapor is less dense. This is going to get science-y so just skip ahead past the green text if you don’t care to know why.

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The WX Factor: Stadium Weather

By Tim Tender on April 19th, 2010 at 4:12 PM

Alabama's Bryant-Denny Stadium.(The Birmingham News / Michelle Williams)

Beaver Stadium is a big place and can hold over 100,000 people. What happens to the air inside the stadium when it’s filled? I would guess that the temperature would rise. What about the humidity? Does that many people affect wind? Does a sellout crowd have a greater effect on temperature than filling half of the stadium?

There’s an article in The Birmingham News that talks about a research project being done that examined just that. It was done at the University of Alabama stadium by a junior at New Orleans. He learned that having warm bodies in the stands does impact the weather. It also impacts the humidity inside the stadium. Here’s an excerpt from the article. If you’re interested in reading the full article, I’ve included the link to the story at the bottom of this post.

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Paternoville and Penn State Saturday

By Tim Tender on September 25th, 2009 at 9:13 PM

Well, it’s been a week of mild temperature (for the most part) and some hit and miss rain showers, but the students in Penn State’s Paternoville are no worse for the wear. They’ve been camping out all week long waiting to usher the rest of the PSU fans into Beaver Stadium on Saturday. Take a look at a few pictures sent to us from @paternovilleVP on Twitter…

Lots of Tents and Lots of Fun at Paternoville

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Grasping at Summer Straws!

By Tim Tender on August 29th, 2009 at 8:54 PM

I have a football on my 7-day forecast denoting the start of high school football season this coming Friday and I am just not ready. For that reason, I’m grasping at summer straws here and pulling out a weather trivia question devoted to the summer sport of baseball.

Take a look at the question then click into the post for the answer.

Trivia Queston

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Is It a Great Day For Golf?

By WJAC Weather on July 14th, 2009 at 10:22 AM

I just found a great weather blog while surfing around the internet looking for interesting weather stories to share.� They had a story about the ideal conditions for driving a golf ball.

I should preface this by saying that the better you are at golf, the more the weather will affect your shot.� For [...]

WX Factor (Revisited)

By WJAC Weather on January 11th, 2009 at 9:26 PM

Thanks again going out to our sister station for this update to the WX Factor.� If you want to search for more about the WX Factor, you can.� You’ll find a couple of blog posts about it over the last couple of months.

Anyway, here’s what they had to say about the WX Factor…

[...]

The WX Factor: Pumpkins

By WJAC Weather on October 27th, 2008 at 9:35 AM

Everybody has them in the front yards or on the porch now and Jeff Oechslein, morning meteorologist at our sister station, WTOV-9 in Steubenville, has more info on how pumpkins are affected by ‘The WX Factor.’

What fruit has edible flowers, originated in Central America, and is made up of 90 percent water? The [...]