January..On & Off Earth

 Cooking heat in the south

Deep freeze to the north

Usual quake, volcano, sunspot scene

And, a monthly column

2 years...whoa!!

January 22 - On & Off Earth

While some will recap the old year, and others will make predictions and resolutions for the new year ahead, I will boldly forecast change: subtle, dramatic, catastrophic, unexpected and seasonal. Anyone that goes into much more detail than that is sure to be wrong; but we all know, more changes are coming.

My hope, that you would get outside daily onto our still delightful, but wild, little planet, remains as true today as in my first On & Off column 23 months ago. Get out daily and you will notice both the subtle and the dramatic changes as they unfold in 2022.

While not a cause for concern here in the Piedmont, the world’s coastlines will kick off 2022 with another reminder of the reality of a warmer world and sea level rise; major coastal flooding from Super King tides.

The combination for January 2nd’s New moon, when our natural satellite is directly between the Earth and Sun, of more water in the ocean, the moon near perigee (closer to Earth) and the Earth near perihelion (closer to the sun) will send high tides sloshing far into the streets of Norfolk as well as into the nooks and crannies of the Bay and Virginia’s tidal rivers.

Our growing concern in the Piedmont, and much of the rest of Virginia, is the ongoing drought. With less than half an inch of rain in both November and December the soil is very dry; only the reality most plants are shut down for the cool of winter keep things from being much worse.

While not the Alps or Rockies, the Appalachians wring out much of the moisture coming our way from the west; the water for our big rain and snow events coming up from the Gulf or off the Atlantic. Climate change is spreading and extending droughts worldwide and while forest fire dangers here are not high, yet, that, too, will change quickly if the winter remains dry.

Venus, Mercury, Saturn and Jupiter begin 2022 in a line in the southwest after sunset (binocs will help with Venus and Mercury), are joined by a thin but growing crescent moon on the 3rd through 5th. Mercury and Saturn move toward each other over the first two weeks of the month (closest on the 12th). Venus passes between the Earth and Sun on the 9th and later in the month is left of Mars and now the Morning Star.

The Full Wolf moon is on the 17th and near apogee (farther from Earth), and is noticeably smaller, though still bright. The sun begins 2022 in Sagittarius, moving into Capricorn on the 20th. The bright stars of winter, dazzling in our dark, country skies, are worth a look on any clear night.

I’d like to finish this month’s column with my thanks to David Holtzman for the opportunity and support to pen this column over the last two years. Also, to readers for all the surprising, far ranging, positive comments I have received. My goal remains to get folks outside to wander and wonder about our amazing planet. Being able to share my passion and sparse knowledge about our shared world has been my pleasure. Time for another walk…

Randy Holladay

Can you see Venus in the V the trees make?

It was there...