1407: Worst Hurricane

2014-08-13T08:52:17Z

D3rrial: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1407
| date = August 13, 2014
| title = Worst Hurricane
| image = worst_hurricane.png
| titletext = 'Finding a 105-year-old who's lived in each location and asking them which hurricane they think was the worst' is left as an exercise for the reader.
}}

This comic has a [http://xkcd.com/1407/large/ larger version] available.

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|We should probably finish that list.}}
The map divides America's Atlantic coast line into regions based on the worst hurricane that has hit each area in the last century. Most of the hurricanes are listed by their US reporting names, with hurricanes from before 1953 (the year when the current naming system was established) simply being listed by their year.

A partial list of all the unnamed hurricanes:
*The {{w|1915 Galveston hurricane}}, which hit hardest along the Texas coastline near Galveston.
*The {{w|1915 New Orleans hurricane}}, which hit hardest in the areas near New Orleans.
*The {{w|1916 Texas hurricane}}, which hit hardest along the west side of Texas's coastline. The other "1916" is from another 1916 hurricane that caused severe floods in an area of North Carolina.
*The {{w|1918_Atlantic_hurricane_season#Hurricane_One|1918 Louisiana hurricane}} ("1918 I"), which hit hardest in western Louisiana.
*The {{w|1921 Tampa Bay hurricane}}, which hit hardest exactly where the name implies.
*The {{w|1926 Nassau hurricane}} ("1926 I"), which hit hardest in a small area of northeastern Florida.
*The {{w|1926 Louisiana hurricane}} ("1926 II"), which hit hardest at the end of the Florida panhandle.
*The {{w|1926 Miami hurricane}} ("1926 III"), which obviously hit the Miami area the hardest. The costliest hurricane in US history.
*The {{w|1933 Chesapeake-Potomac hurricane}}, which hit hardest along the western side of Chesapeake Bay.
*The {{w|1935 Labor Day hurricane}}, which hit hardest along two areas of western Florida. The 1935 hurricane is notable for being the strongest hurricane in American history.
*The {{w|1938 New England hurricane}}, which hit hardest around Long Island and Connecticut. Although Sandy caused more monetary damage to the New Jersey/NYC area, the 1938 hurricane was more powerful and resulted in far more deaths.

The title text is a joke in light of this bleak humor, saying that finding residents in each of the regions who are old enough to have been alive through all of these is quite a daunting task. In principle, this would be the only way to confirm the 'worst hurricane in living memory', and may be taken as a riposte to anyone who wishes to argue this map: 'If you think there was a worse one, find a 105 year old resident who agrees!'

Hurricanes and especially their names have been featured before in comics [[453: Upcoming Hurricanes]], [[944: Hurricane Names]] and [[1126: Epsilon and Zeta]].

==Transcript==
:What's The
:;Worst Hurricane
:Anyone In Your Town Remembers?
:Estimated from Hurdat Database and NCEP rainfall totals
:1914-2014
:[A map of the east coast of the United States as far southwest as the Texas/Mexico border, as far northeast as the Maine/Canada border, and as far inland as Kentucky. The map has coastal regions blocked out with the name and year of the worst hurricane in the last 100 years.]

{{comic discussion}}

1371: Brightness

2014-05-21T07:20:23Z

D3rrial: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1371
| date = May 21, 2014
| title = Brightness
| image = brightness.png
| titletext = Recently, some exoplanet astronomers have managed to use careful analysis of reflected light to discover Earth during the day.
}}

==Explanation==
Exoplanets are planets outside of our solar system, and exoplanet astronomers are astronomers who attempt to discover and study such planets. One method of discovering exoplanets is detecting fluctuations in a star's brightness over time. Such fluctuations could be caused by a planet's orbit around the star, partially blocking the light that reaches an observer on Earth. In the comic, the exoplanet astronomer is trying to observe the sun through the ground at night, observing that it has decreased in brightness compared to daytime (which it has by 100%). She then rightfully concludes that the star is orbited by at least one planet (the Earth), which is of course true.

The title text refers to another method of discovering exoplanets by detecting light reflected off of them from nearby stars. Observing the light that reflects off of the Earth is in fact how we see everything around us, so one hardly needs to be an exoplanet astronomer to discover the Earth in this way.

This comic shows Megan using a common [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exoplanet exoplanet] discovery [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exoplanet#Indirect_methods technique] to discover a planet (Earth) around a nearby star (the Sun). When a planet passes between an observing astronomer and a star the planet will block some of the light coming from that star causing it to appear dimmer for some amount of time. When the Earth does this, we call it [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night Night]

The title text alludes to using more complicated techniques to look observe light reflected off of small, dark planets like the Earth. For example, detecting [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methods_of_detecting_exoplanets#Polarimetry polarized light] reflected from the planet's atmosphere. Since these require light from the star to reflect off of the planet, it's easier for us to image the Earth directly during daylight hours.

More details at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methods_of_detecting_exoplanets

==Transcript==
:[Megan is standing on a black (night-time) background, staring at the ground.]
:Megan: Based on this decrease in the star's brightness, I believe it is orbited by at least one planet.

:Exoplanet Astronomers At Night

{{comic discussion}}

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1407: Worst Hurricane

1371: Brightness