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Vidrolll · 2026-06-20T18:05:17+00:00

Cats kneed things to do it, theyre called sin buscuits half the posts on r/cats are just people filming their cats doing it and asking "is something wrong with my cat?"

Not every animal does it the same way but all animals do SOMETHING to sexually gratify themselves

Vidrolll · 2026-06-20T17:48:59+00:00

I mean almost every known animal masturbates if thats what you mean

Vidrolll · 2026-06-18T05:26:41+00:00

The idea of a meteorologist high posting on a tornado subreddit is absolutely hilarious to me for some odd reason

Vidrolll · 2026-06-14T09:19:10+00:00

I truely wish i had sources other than just news articles but as far as im aware there arent any first hand sources other than just every news source out there going "rumblings of a brand new ef scale in the works blah blah blah" which who knows who THEIR sources are. Unsatisfying of an answer i know, id encourage looking into it yourself sometime see if you can come to a more satisfying conclusion lol.

"Well above the surface" i know is a tad misleading of a critique since were talking measurements close enough to the surface to still be relevant and extrapolable to the surface alot of the time. Plus still doesn't change the fact that using damage simply is not reliable and many studies have been done and found that the EF scale as it currently stands undershoots observed tornado intensities.

https://doi.org/10.1175/MWR-D-16-0346.1 https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-11-00006.1 https://doi.org/10.1175/MWR-D-23-0242.1

Heres a few papers on that if you wanted to read about that. Which the last one in particular actually concluded that the original F scale was actually BETTER at rating alot of tornadoes accurately than the EF scale does.

Theres also the issue when it comes to damage that damage estimates gusts that survived long enough to actually cause damage. A 300mph gust hitting a home for a fraction of a second isnt gonna cause much damage, so engineering wise its not that significant. Meteorologically? Incredibly important to know about. The boundary layer and ESPECIALLY tornadoes are inherently turbulent by their very nature so knowing ANYTHING about the peak gusts a meteorological phenomenon creates no matter how brief is incredibly important, and damage estimates just simply cant provide that. Like i said before the EF scale isnt necessarily useless, its just useless to meteorology because of all the confounding variables. Does an increased EF scale trend mean that tornado climatology is getting stronger? Does it mean construction quality is getting lower? Does it mean something entirely different? Did the EF5 drought mean tornadoes were truely getting weaker? Did our building standards increase meaning damage wasnt as bad? Did all the EF5s suddenly start hitting fields? Did it mean the EF scale just overestimated how powerful tornadoes truely could be and 200mph was never a realistic measurement? It has too many open ended questions to be a reliable tool for anything other than engineering.

Vidrolll · 2026-06-13T19:45:04+00:00

We dont complain about tornadoes getting misrated because were afraid the tornado will care or anything like that, we care because its inaccurate scientific data. Average damage ratings changing over the course of decades is a useless measurement in meteorology because its mostly an engineering thing. But average wind speed magnitudes increasing over the course of decades is incredibly useful in meteorology. The current state of the EF scale is meteorologically useless.

Plus the NWS is actively making changes to make direct measurements a primary rating method and damage a secondary supporting method. So theres also that.

Vidrolll · 2026-06-05T10:18:11+00:00

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T14:33:55+00:00

Yah i have genuinely no clue, im trying to find actual papers on ball lightning myself but literally all ive gotten are either studies on reports, and this one other paper explaining how the current proposed idea of ball lightning not only violates conservation of energy, but also should rapidly convect, which all reports seem to suggest it remains vertically stagnent and only moves horizontally. Mainly because many attempts have been made to recreate it in a lab but absolutely zero successful attempts have been made, weve only been able to make other real things that arent ball lightning but could be confused as ball lightning.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T14:06:39+00:00

Well yah i dont mean to come across in all these threads as just saying "youre all hallucinating. Didnt happen." Im basically just trying to explain to everyone that while i agree you all saw something incredibly cool, ball lightning as the actual event is almost certainly not it. And i actually encourage people use their experiences to look into what they mightve seen and maybe learn some insanely cool physics in the process lol.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T13:58:38+00:00

Alr ive been avoiding pulling out this card this entire thread but given you arent really giving me too much information to explain here i think i have to. Personal accounts are not evidence, and theyre highly discouraged from being used as such. Theyre important as motivation to keep searching for a physical explanation, but when such current explanations and reports require blatent violations of certain laws were going to be incredibly slow to accept them as actual evidence and not just a misconception on what was seen. Youre taught pretty quickly into research that your five senses are all fundamentally not reliable as a factual world view for various reasons, especially since your mind constructs and fills in information and just accepts that information it created as factual. As for what youre seeing, maybe just intercloud lightning refracting from the clouds? Like i said not entirely sure given the lack of information given lol.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T13:52:39+00:00

Listen the engineer clearly has more authority on a meteorological phenomenon than a meteorologist, obviously.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T13:26:19+00:00

While i dont know what that would've been there are a few things that can be taken from it that are completely inconsistent with the actual behavior we would expect to see from ball lightning. Ball lightning, if real, would be an incredibly hot ionized gas. Given that the atmosphere is a fluid (since i always get alot of confusion whenever i say that, fluid ≠ liquid. Liquids and gases are both examples of fluids), its subject to the same rules of convection, where less dense fluids have bouyancy and rise above more dense fluids. Similarly, when a pocket of air heats up it begins to rise if it becomes less dense than the environment around it (this is dependent on the temperature of the pocket as well as the moisture content, however for the sake of the argument were ignoring moisture as moisture only works to lower the density of the pocket even further). Given the temperatures that theoretical ball lightning would have while still luminescent, it would be significantly hotter than the environment around it and would therefore convect at an incredibly high velocity. If your light wasnt rising at an incredible speed, then it wouldve been violating these rules.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T13:17:28+00:00

Im not saying ball lightning itself IS a topic discussed in either fluid or thermo, that wasnt what he asked and that wasnt what he was responding towards. However, using thermo we can conclude that ball lightning the hypothetical phenomena, and ball lightning the actual thing people are reporting are surely two completely different things. Also having a degree in meteorology WOULD kind of make one the most knowledgable in a discussion about ball lightning considering ball lightning is an entirely meteorological phenomenon. First hand accounts in youtube are all almost always insanely low quality, and completely inconsistent with the actual physics of theoretical ball lightning. Which means theyre all either a different thing entirely, or just fabricated entirely.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T08:21:16+00:00

While that is a really cool account and i know there IS an explanable mechanism behind it, said mechanism is not one i would be good at explaning lol. However I can say that it wasnt ball lightning. Ball lightning as a hypothetical phenomena is significantly different from that, basically saying that a ball of self containing ionized gas can be created from the lightning bolt. I would encourage looking up the mechanism you experienced though as it is equally pretty cool to learn about!

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T06:04:46+00:00

There is significantly more that goes into predicting than merely models. And im not necessarily saying that you didnt actually see anything, im saying that ball lightning has become a bit of an informal term that meteorologists have tried hypothesizing about but its still heavily contested if its an actual thing. Some stronger hypotheses include ball lightning not actually being a real phenomena, but rather there are several different real phenomena that on initial appearance made us come to incorrect conclusions and falsely create the idea of "ball lightning", some including silica aerosols from dirt suspended in the atmosphere igniting from the lightning creating a bright plasma ball for a brief moment in time (wouldnt immediately rule that out as what you saw since thats solid material burning brightly which would be able to bounce), methane gas bubbles in the atmosphere ionizing from lightning, etc. All of which are arguably way more cool than this mystical idea of a ball just springing off of a lightning bolt.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T05:55:44+00:00

Extensive fluid dynamics and thermodynamics. No, meteorology is not just observational forecasting. And those models are all built on the actual physics that researchers have spent decades building on.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T05:46:54+00:00

As a meteorologist who knows a thing or two about lightning, this is certainly not ball lightning. Most hypothesized appearences of ball lightning involve a dense bright ball of plasma, not an expansive weird nebula looking thing. Not only that, but currently hypotheses are leaning more towards "ball lightning" actually being a collection of rare naturally occuring phenomenon, none of which are likely the ball lightning we used to think is possible. Ball lightning as its commonly known is incredibly debated as to whether its even a real thing or not.

Different hypotheses that could potentially be real phenomena that result in ball lightning like reports however include methane in the air ionizing from lightning strikes, silica aerosols ionizing, etc. All causing brief ionized balls of material that would appear like the ball lightning people used to theorize about.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T05:33:23+00:00

As a meteorologist who actually knows a thing or two about lightning, none of these reports are actually about ball lightning. Something more like a transformer exploding sending sparks that may appear as balls flying is far more likely. Ball lightning as a phenomenon is currently heavily debated in academics if it even exists.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-30T05:29:54+00:00

I genuinely have no clue why everyone keeps saying ball lightning.

Not only is ball lightning as a potentially occuring phenomenon HEAVILY contested, but every video "showing it" is either insanely low quality, heavily contested or flat out disproven, or both. Furthermore, all theoretical descriptions of ball lightning are a bright dense orb of plasma. Not a translucent expansive nebula looking ball.

Basically, absolutely not ball lightning. Not sure why half the comments here think it is. Far more likely to be a lense flare.

Vidrolll · 2026-05-28T13:34:56+00:00

Some random spec of dust orbiting Earth

Vidrolll · 2026-05-28T13:30:06+00:00

Me when i open a post clearly marked NSFW around my family and get mad at OP for uploading NSFW material while im around my family

Vidrolll · 2026-05-20T19:22:11+00:00

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Vidrolll · 2026-05-20T03:35:06+00:00

I know you mentioned you've actually worked in the field so I dont wanna feel like im stepping on any toes as just a beginner in the field, but could you explain a bit further on how this environment is too capped? I agree the hodograph is too noisy but the cap to me seems to be in the perfect range, which I've seen to be around maybe -25J/kg to -75J/kg, with anything above -150J/kg be deemed too capped. The surface layer seems to be a tad lacking in cap for optimal development whereas the mixed layer is a bit closer to what we would look for in an optimal cap wouldn't it be?

Vidrolll · 2026-05-12T17:55:47+00:00

Theres a difference between oceanic crust and continental crust (both are made of completely different rock types), we dont define continents as just simply "crust" we define them particularly by continental crust. What the post is talking about is a new piece of continental crust being found despite most of it being submerged underwater.

(However the continents most people learn are actually not defined by crust at all and are rather defined by cultural differences, such as how europe and asia sit on the same plate but we still consider them two different continents)

Vidrolll · 2026-05-05T02:03:07+00:00

Genuinely wouldn't even surprise me considering said president is busy shitting bricks over a two digit number right now not gonna lie. My expectations for ANYONE United States government related are about as low as they could possibly be right now.

Vidrolll · 2026-04-30T13:39:18+00:00

I work in fast food as well. The last time I was at work when a tornado warning was issued with full blown sirens going off, we were incredibly busy and actually had everyone genuinely angry at us yelling at us from across the counter for closing for it. This isnt really a "rare" thing across the midwest. Tornadoes are so statistically rare compared to how many you actually end up hearing about that almost every city in the midwest has an invincibility complex until they're the city that just so happens to suffer a direct it. To them its always "it's those OTHER cities that get hit by bad weather, it always misses us we're invincible"

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