EYE ON ACTIVISM

featuring Connor Mockett

Hello, everyone! Welcome back to another week of The Weather with Connor. Last column, I talked about my top 3 favourite storm chases I’ve ever been on. This week, I thought I’d talk about the story of my worst storm chase.

Disclaimer: I know this storm was a huge deal for many, many people and turned their lives upside down. I am not diminishing that, just talking about my chase day when it happened.

The date is Saturday, May 21, 2022. It was a warm late spring day, and thunderstorms were forecast across a wide area from the Eastern Ontario region, all the way to the Quebec City region. The thunderstorms in the Eastern Ontario region were supposed to fire up in the early afternoon, and generally be non-severe in nature. Parameters were not all that impressive around here. Southeastern Quebec, however, was supposed to have a big day. A tornado outbreak was actually possible that day, and a tornado watch was issued in the early afternoon as storms started to fire in the middle of the afternoon.

The Quebec event was pretty hyped up in the weather community. For multiple days in advance, weather models were consistently showing an environment capable of producing tornadoes in isolated supercells. On Saturday morning, I took one final look at the models, and headed out to my target area: Trois-Rivières, Quebec. This was the furthest east I’d ever chased, but I knew the terrain

I packed my car with my chasing essentials. Cameras, dashcam, snacks, and an overnight bag for a hotel in case I chased into the night. I left at about 8:30 am that morning and began my 4 hour drive to my target. So far, so good, nothing has gone wrong with my day.

About 2.5 hours into my drive, I stop one final time to look at the models and current radar. At this point I’m well past Montreal, so there’s no turning back. During this stop, I begin seeing tweets and reports about a terrible storm tearing through Southern Ontario. Models hadn’t picked up on this storm until the morning it was happening, so it was unexpected by me and others in the chasing community. Anyway, I continue my drive towards Trois-Rivieres, thinking there’s no way that strong of a storm will make it all the way to the Ottawa area.

At about 12:30 pm, I get to Trois-Rivières, and begin the toughest game there is: sitting and waiting. Storms are expected to fire in the next 2-3 hours, so I head down to the St. Lawrence River right in town to get a good viewing area for each direction.

Around 1pm, I start looking at the Ontario storm again. It strengthened even more and was just going through Peterborough at the time. At this point, I sounded the alarm that something bad was coming. I remember word for word what I typed on Facebook that afternoon, “A destructive Derecho is heading straight for the Ottawa Region. Winds of 120km/ h+ are likely”.

I was 4 hours away from home waiting for storms, while the storm of the decade was heading straight for my stomping grounds of Eastern Ontario. It was a terrible feeling knowing something terrible was going to happen, and I wasn’t there to see it, chase it, or report on it. Before I even saw a storm in Quebec, my day was already kind of a bummer.

Anyway, let’s get back to Quebec. Storms indeed fired around 2:30 pm in the hot and muggy 32 degree weather. I crossed over the St. Lawrence River to get on the northern side of it, and headed towards my target storm about 20 minutes west of TroisRivières. That storm, along with pretty much every single other one around there, wasn’t able to get its act together. Storms were high based (meaning the clouds weren’t low to the ground), and honestly not all that pretty.

At the time when I started to leave the TroisRivières region, I started to really figure out what happened at home in Ottawa and around the area. That Derecho really tore places apart, from completely destroying forests and powerlines, to in some cases, homes. I was disgusted with my decision to chase 4 hours away from home at this point, and it made for a really long drive home.

On my way home, I actually intercepted the Derecho in Quebec, as it had made its way further east out of Ontario. I was just west of Sorel-Tracy at 5:30 pm when I got into it, and I ended up recording a 74km/h wind gust on my Kestrel Meter with my hand hanging out the window on the side of the road to do so. The winds took down many trees along HWY 40 in Quebec, and took out power.

After that interception of the Derecho while it was weakening, I decided to end the chase, get gas, and go home. I was disappointed the entire drive that I wasn’t home to chase that storm, and Quebec’s storms being a bust didn’t make that feeling any better. I had just missed a once in a decade, maybe once in a lifetime, storm that was only 30 minutes north of my house in Winchester. Without a doubt my worst chase ever.

I don’t think we’ll see a storm like that again for a long, long time.

Sex, gender identity and pronouns

by Zara Zrudlo

Sex, gender identity and pronouns have recently been a very commonly discussed topic, but why are we talking about them so much, and why do they matter? And what can we do to be more supportive?

In this ,I’ve put together a compilation of some basic information. Some definitions to start off:

- Sex is what people are assigned at birth based on their external genitalia: male, female or intersex—people whose sex organs don’t fit into either of the binary genders.

- Gender Identity is how people really feel on the inside, regardless of their sex.

- Pronouns—he/him, she/her, they/them, ey/ eir—are what people use when referring to themselves or others, depending on their gender identity.

People often think of gender as one or the other, male or female. In reality, it is a spectrum! In that spectrum, there is a huge space between male and female, with many gender identities in that gap. Some examples include non-binary, where a person does not identify with being a man or a woman, and gender fluid, where a person’s gender identity fluctuates through the spectrum of male, female and the wide space between.

The variety in gender identities are supported by a research study done by Cambridge University. They studied the brains of 10,000 people and found that 25% of brains were more typically female, 25% were male and 50% showed characteristics from different parts of the spectrum, some completely in the middle, some to either side. This may contribute to the multitude of gender identities, but not everyone who’s brain isn’t extremely male or extremely female identifies as non-binary.

Sometimes people’s gender inside is different from the gender they were assigned at birth—people like that are called trans or transgender. There is actual science showing that this isn’t just a mental construct, it is actually in our DNA and brains. For example, the brain of a person who was assigned male at birth but identifies as a female will exhibit more female characteristics than someone who was assigned male at birth and identifies as male inside as well—cis-gender.

For hundreds of years, people’s pronouns—he/ him, she/her, they/them, ey/eir— and sex have been determined by their genitalia. However, as I’ve described above, it’s a lot more complicated than that, and has been for as long as humans have existed.

A common question is ‘Why would we even use pronouns other than she and he in the first place?’ Calling people by their pronouns is a matter of respect. It’s similar to remembering someone’s name, and calling them that, not just a name you think would fit them. It fosters inclusion and equity, and can make people feel welcome, instead of misunderstood and excluded.

The most common pronouns are she/her and he/him; however, there have been attempts to use gender neutral pronouns for people who don’t fit either of the binary genders since the 14th century, although that hasn’t really been accepted until now. Even now, however, 2SLGBTQ2IA+ people can face violence, murder, and discrimination.

With such a spectrum of different identities that are scientifically proven but still receive so much hate and doubt, suicide rates for 2SL-

GBTQ2IA+ youth are five times higher than straight and cis-gender youth. In Canada, 2SLGBTQ2IA+ youth make up 25 to 40% percent of homeless youth, partly because a lot of families kick their children out if they find out that they are 2SLGBTQ2IA+.

Assuming someone’s pronouns based on how they dress or look can be really hurtful, so just something as simple as introducing yourself with your pronouns and asking other people what theirs are can lower suicide rates and make people feel safe and welcome. An example sentence could be: “Hi! My name’s Zara. My pronouns are they/them, do you feel comfortable sharing yours?”

If you don’t have a chance to ask people what their pronouns are, don’t assume. Use they/them, which are gender neutral pronouns, until you know! It may take a little time to get used to it, considering it hasn’t been considered grammatically correct until recently. However, grammar is less important than someone’s life, so if people tell you what their pronouns are, respect is of the utmost importance.

Zara Zrudlo is a homeschooled, fourteen year old resident of Kemtpville. They love writing, art, acting, reading and anything to do with music. Ever since they were little, they’ve cared a lot about activism and social justice, and hoped to make a difference in the world. Zara has written two and a half novels, and ran a newspaper for their friends and family for three years. They love hanging out with their dogs and chickens and spending time imagining having dinner with various book characters.

Dundas Agricultural Hall of Fame and Gala

submitted

by Leslie Johnson

The Dundas Agricultural Hall of Fame and Gala will be held on April 1, 2023 at the Matilda Hall in Dixon's Corners. This year’s inductees are Estella Rose of Mountain, and Stan Vanden Bosch (posthumously) of Chesterville.

This year's gala will also be a celebration of the Dundas Federation of Agriculture's 80th Anniversary.

The event includes a cocktail hour starting at 6 pm followed by a catered dinner at 7 pm, as well as the awards ceremony and a silent and live auction. The proceeds of the evening will be going to the Community Food Share as well as the Winchester District Memorial Hospital.

Tickets are $45 each and are available by contacting Leslie Johnson at 613-229-1751 or by email at cljohnson@bell.net