OTUS THE HEAD CAT : In ’95, humidity pods migrated late but big
Posted on Saturday, July 22, 2006
Note: Otus the Head Cat is on assignment. This is the second of three past columns he wrote about Arkansas’ annual humidity pods. The column, reprinted at the request of Arkansas Parks and Tourism, was published June 17, 1995.
Despite this week’s cooler temperatures, the long-anticipated and oppressive annual humidity pods are on their way. Readers are urged to take precautions this weekend because this summer’s pod activity promises to break records.
These, you see, are dreaded Mexican pods, not the relatively mild South Texas variety.
For readers new to this column, it has been our habit for 16 years to track the yearly humidity pod migration from their wintering grounds off South Padre Island, Texas, to Arkansas. It is a public service I’m proud to perform.
Already this season there have been a few false alarms, but evidently Hurricane Allison delayed the pods’ arrival.
“Normally we would have seen the first pod event by the first week of June,” Robert Guiteramo of the National Weather Service said Friday in New Orleans. “But Allison slowed their arrival by perhaps three weeks.” Guiteramo reports that weather service P-3 Orion and C-130 H aircraft have been tracking the pods since Monday, when satellites first indicated northward movement.
Between October and June, the pods are normally found about 35 miles off the Texas coast between Corpus Christi and Brownsville, but this year they have wintered in an area between Cancun and Cozumel, Mexico, and the Gulf of Guanahacabibes on the western tip of Cuba.
“This is one of those rare 20-to 30-year cycles that we in the weather business call La Brujaitas,” the 25-year forecasting veteran says. “The pods or, more correctly, superpods, have been soaking up the rays down there off Mexico. They’re really packing a punch and it looks like it’s going to be a nasty summer for us.” The pods work in conjunction with the infamous Bermuda High to raise the humidity levels across Arkansas to almost unbearable levels. They travel in clumps of up to 150 bubble units that have been reported to be as large as 50 feet in diameter. Most, however, are the size of a 1985 Chevrolet Silverado. Some podlettes are as small as basketballs.
Pilots who frequently fly over the Gulf of Mexico report the pods travel northward at altitudes between 5, 000 and 7, 500 feet on the leading edges of maritime tropical (mT ) squall lines and form quite a sight as they journey northward.
Benson Warren of Fordyce is such a pilot. A Vietnam veteran with two tours under his belt, Warren told The AP that he had seen the phenomenon many times in the past, but on a recent vacation to Belize, he encountered the massing pods and got the scare of his professional career.
Warren was piloting a Beechcraft KingAir twin-engine turboprop when he had his close encounter.
“We were inbound for Belmopan at 300 knots and 10, 000 feet. About 50 klicks off Xkalak we hit what must have been the mother of all rogue pods.
“ It looked for all the world like a huge soap bubble glistening in the sun. We normally try to fly around those puppies, but this pod was hiding behind a bank of altostratus clouds and we were on it before we knew it.” Warren had to call upon years of flying skill honed under combat conditions to survive the encounter.
“It was like hitting a blob of lard the size of the Astrodome,” Warren said. “Air speed dropped to stall warning. The right prop feathered and I had to dive just to maintain heading. If that monster is any indication of what’s headed our way, then it’s going to be a real bad summer.” The weather service reports the pods should make landfall and fan out Sunday, approaching Little Rock around 7 a.m. Monday. The Seventh Annual City of Little Rock Sunrise PodWatch party is planned for 6 to 10 a.m. Monday at the Belvedere in Riverfront Park. Lark in the Morning will play traditional Druid pod welcoming tunes at 7 a.m. and the Greater Little Rock Montessori Children’s Choir will sing a medley of weather-related songs to close the ceremonies. Pod welcomers are urged to bring their own refreshments and plenty of towels. In the event of rain, the festivities will be canceled. Until next time, Kalaka reminds you that humidity pods never sleep. Disclaimer: Fayetteville-born Otus the Head Cat’s award-winning column of humorous fabrication appears every Saturday. E-mail: mstorey@arkansasonline. com
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