THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, December 22, 1994 TAG: 9412210168
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 03 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY SHIRLEY BRINKLEY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 97 lines
IF ANYONE IS interested in the weather forecast for Christmas Day, the information is readily available.
That's Christmas Day, 1995.
The forecast for this coming Sunday has already been predicted and announced by radio and television meteorologists, so that's old news. However, for those who are thinking ahead - planning a trip or an outdoor wedding - Boyd Quate's ``Q-Calendar'' could prove helpful.
According to Quate's calendar, the 1995 Christmas holiday will be clear and cold in Hampton Roads. January 1995 will be bitter cold, Easter Sunday will be mild, and Tidewater will be unusually hot in July.
Quate, a Holland resident, is a retired meteorologist with 50 years of experience in Virginia Beach and California. He specializes in long-range forecasting. For the past 12 years, he has made forecasts for the ``Almanac for Farmers and City Folks,'' which claims to be correct 85 percent of the time.
Quate was mentioned in the Nov. 21 issue of Forbes magazine for having predicted a very high and unusual number of severe storms over New England this winter, for the benefit of those car dealers who sell four-wheel-drive vehicles.
Recently, Quate decided to use his research work to put together a calendar that forecasts the weather for each day of 1995. On each map, areas of precipitation and the temperatures are plotted by computer to show the reader what type weather he or she can expect in any area of the country for any day of the year.
Now Quate is offering the calendar to clubs and civic organizations to use as a fund-raiser. The only cost to the clubs is for computer work, printing, and postage. Quate makes no profit from the sales.
``The weather forecasts are based on analogies,'' Quate said, ``and sunspots play a role. There are large areas of magnetic action on the sun, which vary in number from a few to a large number and then back to a few again on an 11-year cycle. Every other cycle or every 22 years, they seem to be associated with droughts. The years '96 and '97 are at the bottom of a 22-year cycle.
``We use a combination of the position of the moon and the number of sunspots to determine where certain types of weather will occur,'' Quate said. ``We can make a forecast two years in advance.''
Quate said he observes conditions now and goes back in history to a time when conditions were similar to current periods. He uses those periods as the basis of forecasts.
The Q-Calendars were displayed recently at the Holland Ruritan Club convention in Chesapeake. Proceeds from the calendars will benefit the Ruritans' Foundation Scholarship fund program.
A native of Milford, Utah, Quate's family moved to Garden Grove, Calif., when he was 15. After studying at the University of Utah and the Boeing School of Aeronautics in Oakland, Calif., Quate received a bachelor's degree in aeronautical engineering with a major in meteorology.
``I took a course in meteorology and got straight A's,'' he said. ``I got two C's in engineering, so I thought there was a message there.''
Quate's career as a meteorologist took him all over the United States, as well as South America. His first job was forecasting the weather for United Airlines in Chicago. Later, he joined Pan American Grace Airways, which required a move to Santiago, Chile.
He met his future wife, Suffolk native Martha Rountree, in 1941 when a group of exchange students traveled to Chile. The couple married in October 1942 after Quate returned to the States after World War II began.
``I joined the Army and was assigned to Washington,'' he said. ``Then I was transferred to Cal Tech in Pasadena, Calif., for research and training. I taught men how to forecast for chemical warfare.''
In 1946, the family moved to Suffolk and Quate sold farm machinery for a brief period. However, in 1952, he returned to the weather business and went to work in Denver, in charge of Utah-Nevada projects.
``Rainmaking was just beginning then,'' he said. ``In 1956, I quit and formed my own company in Sacramento, Calif.''
In 1959, Quate won a contract to go to Panama and studied cloud-seeding or rain-making over banana plantations for a fruit company for five years.
After buying a radio station in Montgomery, Ala., the family moved back to Holland in 1970 and Quate has been in long-range weather forecasting ever since . . . supplying information to farmers and businesses that need to plan ahead.
After his wife died in 1988, Quate retired and now lives with his daughter, Martha Rountree, in Holland. He also has a son, Boyd E. Quate of Holland, and a grandson.
Quate enjoys traveling and giving talks about his weather research to clubs and organizations. In addition to his weather work, Quate is the author of a newly published book entitled ``Pioneers of Snake Valley,'' a collection of true stories about the people who settled in western Utah and eastern Nevada after the Civil War. MEMO: Those interested in the Q-Calendar may contact Beverly Skinner-Lassen,
director of marketing research at the Virginia Beach office,
804-495-1353. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by Michael Kestner
Boyd Quate, a professional meteorologist...
by CNB