Meteorologist - Richard "Heatwave" Berler, C.B.M.
heatwave@pro8news.com
By
Ray Gomez
Story Created:
Oct 23, 2008 at 3:06 PM CDT
Story Updated:
Apr 18, 2012
I can’t believe that I get to immerse myself in the weather every working day, and that I get to do this in one of the most unique climates in the United States. While other southern locations offer warm temperatures, inland far southern Texas can experience winter and spring heat episodes that are not felt elsewhere, even in Death Valley. During these months, very warm air sometimes forms over a fairly deep layer of the atmosphere over the Chihuahua and Coahuila desert area of Mexico. As this air moves east and northeastward off of the high desert, it mainly rides up and above warm humid air from the Gulf of Mexico, and is not experienced at ground level. In our part of Texas, however, this hot air occasionally mixes down to the surface, and arrives as particularly hot air. In recent years, Laredo has reached 99 on November 27, 2005, 103 on February 20, 1986, 105 on March 6, 1991, and 110 on April 8, 1989. Zapata reached 98 on January 4, 1997 which equaled the U.S. record high for the month of January set earlier in Laredo during 1914 and 1936.
I have been the chief meteorologist at KGNS since February 14, 1980. I took over the responsibility for the official Laredo temperature and rainfall observations on June 10, 1985. I was the 18th person to be awarded the Certified Broadcast Meteorologist designation by the American Meteorological Society in 2005. I have presented at 3 AMS Broadcast Meteorology conferences since 2003, and at the AMS’s14th Symposium on Meteorological Observation and Instrumentation. Links to my 2008 presentation on uncertainties in the projection of future climates, and my 2007 presentation on inaccuracies in the instrumental record are at:
http://ams.confex.com/ams/36Broadcast/wrfredirect.cgi?id=9588
http://ams.confex.com/ams/87ANNUAL/wrfredirect.cgi?id=6607
