Editor gets day trudging in snow

A yardstick is not standard issue from the National Weather Service for measuring snow, but that’s how one was used back in February when duty called. 
(Pine Bluff Commercial/Byron Tate)
A yardstick is not standard issue from the National Weather Service for measuring snow, but that’s how one was used back in February when duty called. (Pine Bluff Commercial/Byron Tate)

It may be a while before anyone forgets the middle of February 2021. I was reminded of that on Friday while compiling statistics for the end-of-year weather story that is in today's edition.

Not only did the high temperatures that week not reach freezing for several days on end, but there were two big snowstorms that further gripped the city.

From a news standpoint, I knew that we were experiencing something very unusual. So pretty much every day I was on the phone with the National Weather Service forecasters in North Little Rock who are, by the way, some of the nicest people journalists get to talk to.

One afternoon, after a crushing amount of snow fell, I called their office for a story for the next day's paper. The forecaster I talked to was Thomas Jones. He had gotten used to my calls by this point, and was, as always, being very patient as he described what was going on with our weird weather. So when he asked something along the lines of "hey, could you do us a favor and go out and measure the snow?" it caught me off guard. Me? Measure the snow?

Apparently, the person who normally provided that information wasn't able to do so or maybe their equipment wasn't working. But the National Weather Service needed my help, and I jumped at the opportunity, suddenly picturing myself as an intrepid weather spotter. If anyone asked what I was doing, I could tell them to scram, I'm on government business.

Carrying out my duties, I laced up my boots, threw on a coat and grabbed a yardstick and a notepad and headed out. Jones had not been specific about what he meant by "measure the snow," but I took it upon myself to make a dozen or more measurements and then average them. I would trudge through the knee-high snow, stop, delicately insert the stick and then record it. I suddenly felt as if I was part of the brother-and-sisterhood of weather enthusiasts who did this every day, even if they might scoff at my technique.

I don't remember the depth of the snow, but it was as accurate as my low-tech car dealership-sponsored yardstick could muster. When I called Jones back, I gave him the figure, and he thanked me, and that was that. My one day, actually, my one half-hour of contributing to the permanent weather records of Pine Bluff was over.

I took off my boots and coat and returned to my life as a mild-mannered newspaper editor and went back to working on my weather story. Except this one time, instead of quoting Jones or any of the other forecasters about the snowfall in Pine Bluff, I quoted myself. Heady stuff.

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