An Act of Todd
Blog Update — Carl Forecast Evaluation
Grade — F
Hundreds of lives lost, thousands injured, and millions of dollars in damages. Homes destroyed, memories lost, whole communities thrown into disarray. As those of you who follow closely the work of the team here at An Act of Todd (and we thank you for all your follows and likes), you know that we do not shy away from rigorous self-evaluation and analysis. We recognize that as forecasters, the sacred trust that is placed in us is one we must constantly earn and must now restore. Our reputation is only as good as the last weather report. As such, our current reputation is shit. We are deeply sorry for screwing up and frankly even more distraught that we cannot even assure you it won’t happen again, as we have no idea how it happened this time.
We are not casting blame elsewhere, as everyone has to do their jobs with the best information available. When streets move, the garbage men still have to pick up the garbage, even if no one tells them about the street moving. Maybe that’s not the best analogy, but our point is that we aren’t blaming the reduction in hurricane hunter flights and we aren’t saying someone else screwed up. We are saying we looked at the data and we got it wrong. We have gone back over the data since the disaster and are prepared to say we would still get it wrong. Hurricane Carl did not hit the coast of North Carolina, but it did.
This may be basic stuff for many of you who follow us closely, but for the rest, we want to make a few things clear. Carl hitting the East Coast was not an unlikely forecast outlier that we should have flagged as a possibility, however small. There was not a single computer model that had the storm coming ashore with anything more than a glancing blow. There are multiple models each with different algorithms allowing for different analysis of the data, and all of those analyses had the storm curving out to sea. Honestly, it didn’t even appear to be that tough a forecast. It’s as though someone picked the hurricane up off of a map and placed it somewhere else, or the hurricane just decided to ignore global steering currents and go its own way. But, that can’t happen. It just can’t. It did, though. It did. We are so, so sorry.
We just want our readers to know that we are working 24/7 to try and solve this mystery, well except for sleeping a little, eating, and well, you know. Just trying to be totally transparent with you, our readers. We know you are upset. We are upset, too.
You should know that top people are working on this, too. We have been in direct contact with the new Administrator of NOAA and she is, well awesome and really influential, so if we need anything at all, she can get it. Some of you may be aware, but it turns out she is really close with the President, so rest assured this is being taken very seriously.
Stay tuned to the blog for updates, and thank you for your understanding and constructive criticism, which we totally get and appreciate.
**********
Gale slapped the piece of paper down on the conference table and looked up at the screen on the far wall where the faces of Todd, Mark, and Sarah stared back at her from the Florida Hurricane Center Building.
“Do you all feel better now? Have you sufficiently confessed your sins to the world?” she started in.
“I . . .” started Dr. Todd, namesake of the blog.
“Not yet!” Gale interrupted. “You know this is public, right? You know that things you type and put on the Internet can be accessed by others, right?” A snicker from Gale’s right earned Tripp a silencing glare.
“Of course,” Todd said indignantly. “We . . .”
“Still, no,” Gale interrupted again. “Do you know what national security means? Do you know what an investigation is? Do you know how to not look like a bunch of clueless bungling freaking idiots?”
She stared straight ahead at the screen until finally it was Sarah who said, “Can we talk now?”
After another long pause, Gale nodded.
Todd took a deep breath and said, “Our work has always been done in the public sphere. That’s just the way weather is. All of our data is public and, obviously, our forecasts are blasted out to as many people as possible. We’ve found that being as honest and open with the public serves us well and creates a bond of trust. If we ignored our mistakes, we’d get roasted, and people wouldn’t trust our warning as much. That’s why we wrote that.” He indicated the piece of paper she’d been slowly crumpling into a ball. Sarah and Mark nodded in agreement. It had taken three tries, but Todd had finally gotten the words out that they’d all agreed to say after learning Gale wanted to talk to them this afternoon.
“Thank you for that explanation,” Gale said. “Tripp, could I have the document the President signed earlier today please?” Tripp slid an official looking piece of paper over to Gale. The Presidential Seal was very visible on the bottom.
“By order of the President,” Gale began to read, “the following individuals, Dr. Todd Carroll, Dr. Mark Fendler, and Captain Sarah Decosta, current employees of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, are hereby remanded to Guantanamo Bay detention facility for a period of no more than the rest of their lives for the crime of being morons and endangering national security.”
“Is that real?” asked Mark weakly.
Gale held up the document to the camera, so they could read it closely.
“You’ll see it’s signed, but not dated. Henry gave me the flexibility to date it whenever I felt it was necessary. As you know from your blog post, we are very close friends,” Gale said.
“So, here’s what is going to happen from now until we get this mess figured out. You are actually going to work 24/7 and you are not going to write anymore blogs or talk to the press or answer your phones or emails unless it is directly related to Carl or a request from me.” Gale’s voice had gone Bond-villian quiet. “Do you understand?”
They understood.
“Wonderful. Now what have you learned?”
Relief spread across the screen. The lack of a rendition was appreciated.
“We’ve narrowed down the source of the error to two unlikely possibilities,” Todd stated. “And before you ask, there are no likely possibilities, so this is what we’ve got.”
“Go on, then,” Gale urged.
Todd turned to Sarah, who said, “The first possibility is that someone figured out how to steer or at least change the trajectory of a hurricane.”
“I thought you told me that was impossible,” Gale said. “Something about a nuclear bomb being like a fart in the wind, if I recall.” More snickering from Tripp earned him a crumpled paper ball off the forehead.
“Right, yes,” Sarah conceded. “But, we’re wondering if someone has come up with something we’re not thinking of. You know, after World War II, the government spent a bunch of money trying to control or weaken hurricanes. They even had some success, but the results were so unpredictable, it was decided the solution might end up being worse than the problem. Since then, nothing.
“But, I have some connections with a few sci-fi writers from a consulting gig I did a couple years back and I bounced some ideas off of them. You know, like the FBI and defense guys did after 9/11 to force them to think outside the box. So, anyway, they had some pretty out-there ideas, things like massive clouds of nanobots or space mirrors. I just can’t imagine any of those things would work or even if they did, they’d be pretty damn noticeable, but, it got us thinking that maybe impacting the track of a hurricane isn’t as impossible as we’ve assumed. We just lack the imagination to envision how.”
“I’m not sure talking to sci-fi writers meets my criteria for keeping things in-house, but I guess that’s water under the bridge,” Gale admitted. “However, I’m not hearing a solution, unless you’re going to suggest aliens are involved.”
“Well,
no,” admitted Sarah. “I, we, just thought this was a promising line of inquiry
and there is a sci-fi convention in Miami next week that I thought I could go
to and maybe make a short presentation, see what I stir up and . . .”.
Sarah cut off at the expression on Gale’s
face.
“Too public?” she asked.
“Just a bit,” Gale remarked sourly.
“Okay, then maybe go and arrange some discreet side conversations?” Sarah suggested. “I have some pretty solid cosplay costumes I could wear just to stay anonymous.”
Gale turned to Tripp, who was shaking his head, but smiling at the same time.
Looking back at Sarah and wishing the world could be just a little less weird, she said, “I don’t think that’s necessary.”
“Okay, just discreet conversations then,” Sarah replied, unable to hide the disappointment in her voice. She had the sweetest Boba Fett outfit in her closet but it seemed it was going to have to stay there for now.
“Now, you’re getting the hang of it,” Gale said encouragingly. “You said there were two unlikely possibilities.”
“Absolutely,” said Mark, jumping into the conversation with his best television voice, deep and reassuring, like a warm hug on a chilly fall morning. Mark was very good at his job. He went places others ran from. He courted danger and dated chaos. He was a living, breathing cliche.
“As you know,” he began, “we’ve been poring over the data sets and rerunning the various models to see if we could identify errors. So far nothing.”
Gale sighed. “Mark, you are not on the six o’clock news. I do not need a teaser or a lead-in. Just get to the point.”
“Right, of course. Sorry, but here’s the thing, we were able to recreate the path of Carl by entering in bad data to the models.”
“What do you mean, bad data?” Gale asked leaning forward.
“I mean numbers that were just made up to try and recreate the path Carl took. Not anything from any aircraft, satellite, ship or buoy. We just took the actual path that Carl took and tried to come up with a set of coordinates that would have matched up with what happened.”
“How is that helpful?” Gale asked. “We know where the hurricane went. That’s not a mystery.”
“True, yes, of course,” Mark said. “But, here’s the thing, we demonstrated that Carl could have taken the track it did without any crazy sci-fi stuff involved. From where it started to where it actually went was not impossible based on what was happening in the atmosphere. The data we had just didn't think it was possible.”
“So, we’re right back to where we started then?” Gale pointed out. “Bad data, but why or how?”
“Well, yes, I guess, but this provides us with another option aside from alien nanobots to explore. How did the data get bad?” Mark pointed out. Sarah quietly seethed. Despite liking Mark a lot as a human, sometimes as a colleague he could be infuriating. She imagined just what Boba Fett would do to Mark in this situation and it was deeply satisfying and bloody.
“Okay, here’s what I need from you. I need a one-page memo, and I mean one page, I can share with the President that makes sci-fi writers and inexplicably bad data sound like progress. Can you do that?” Gale asked.
The three weather forecasters--bloggers, PhDs., professionals all--nodded meekly like they’d just been told to apologize for breaking old man Winslow’s window after being told twenty times not to play ball near his house.
“Great. That’s all for . . . what?” Gale asked as Tripp loudly cleared his throat.
Speaking to the screen, Tripp said, “I have a note here saying there was another issue you wanted to raise with the Administrator.”
“Oh, yes, of course. Thank you,” Todd said.
“Well, what is it?” Gale asked exasperated.
Todd cleared his throat. “Well, it’s just we thought you’d want to know right away that there’s another storm brewing just off the coast of Africa.”
“Perfect,” Gale whispered. She smacked down the phone cutting off the connection to Florida. “Get the car,” she barked to Tripp.
He stood to go.
“Wait,” she said. “Where in God’s name did you get a piece of paper with the Presidential seal?” Gale asked.
“I cut it off of your nomination papers. I figured you wouldn’t mind,” Tripp said matter-of-factly.
“Seriously?”
He nodded.
“I guess with another storm brewing I can live without another piece of paper on my wall. But maybe ask next time.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
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