thebattalionasks
Q:
What is the best or worst family vacation you have ever been on?
thebattalion ● tuesday,
july 7, 2009
● serving
texas a&m since 1893
● first paper free – additional copies $1 ● © 2009 student media
Elizabeth Yang junior political science major
“Me and a group of friends went camping at Lake Bryan over the winter. We didn’t bring sleeping bags. Got in trouble for building a bonfire. It was pretty epic. Apparently there was a burn ban that we didn’t know about. We stayed up until like 6 in the morning, so that was fun.”
Santosh Nazare sophomore public health major
“Once we went to my grandpa’s place, in rural India. We went with all my family members. There was a huge rural spring festival. I’d never seen anything like that in my city area.”
Selyna Nunez senior bioenvironmental sciences major
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Drought strikes College Station missing summer lightning Meagan O’Toole-Pitts
“In the Bahamas. Just enjoying the scenery. The beach. The white sand. I went with a friend and her family. We went sailing around to the different islands.”
Drew Wendeborn senior spatial sciences major “My best family vacation would have to be to Alaska. Part of my family lives there. We went halibut fishing. It was fun. We parked the boat on an island and had a fire on the beach.”
Satoshi Kamata wildlife and fisheries sciences graduate student
Hispanic studies prepares trailblazer ■ First doctorate degree recipient supports program, University
“The best one is when I was a small kid I went to my grandparents’ house in northern Japan. It’s a very grand place. I caught a cicada and beetles and put them in a small cage and fed them watermelons. We had handmade syrup and we watched fireworks.”
Cathrin DiFilippo freshman biology major
“When I went to Colorado with my whole family. We were all really nice to each other. We drove 15 hours to Colorado Springs. We went skiing.” Kalee Bumguardner and Stephen Fogg — THE BATTALION
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The Battalion The drought has an upside — less lightning. Houston, the lightning capital of Texas, is struck about eight to 10 times per square kilometer per year, said National Weather Service lightning expert John Jensenius, and College Station is struck about eight times per square kilometer per year. The number of lightning strikes per year in College Station is much smaller than in Houston simply because of the city’s smaller size, he said. “With a geographic area of 1,558 square kilometers, the Houston area would have between about 12,500 and 15,580 cloud-to-ground lightning flashes in a typical year,” Jensenius said. “Of course, if you are simply counting the number of lightning strikes in a city area, then the geographic size of the city will largely influence the number of lightning strikes.” Ordinarily the College Station area sees an accelerated incidence of lightning in the summer, said atmospheric sciences professor and Cooperative Institute for Applied Meteorological Studies director Richard Orville, but
Megan Clark The Battalion Since the first Hispanic Studies Ph.D. was awarded to Juan Carlos Ureña in 2008, more doctoral graduates are expected, said Alessandra Luiselli, associate professor and the recipient of the 2009 Texas A&M Women’s Progress Award. The graduate program was first conceived in 1997, developed from 1998 to 2003 and approved by the University and Board of Regents in 2004. The first students entered the graduate program in the fall of 2004. Ureña’s dissertation, “History and Poetic Structure of Hispanic Popular Song,” was introduced in April and Ureña graduated in August of 2008. Ureña is now an assistant professor at Stephen F. Austin University and plans to continue teaching Spanish and pursuing his career in music. “I think the completion of his degree has had a positive and beneficial impact on his employment See Degree on page 4
drought has inhibited thunderstorms. “As the temperature rises, we experience more lightning. Note as we go from January to the summer, the temperature rises and we have more thunderstorms. So we know the trend and why we have more lightning. It is a function of temperature and moisture,” Orville said. “But drought brings less lightning and less thunderstorms.” A recent change in the jet stream has caused hindrance of thunderstorms and consequently a drought, said Gary Huffines, University of Northern Colorado associate professor of meteorology and Texas A&M doctoral graduate. “Thunderstorm activity in the country has been shifting because of changes in the jet stream, so places like Colorado are seeing more thunderstorms than we are [in College Station]. We have a high pressure center along the coast here and that’s averting a lot of the storms away from us,” Huffines said. “That’s something that happens occasionally, some years the jet stream will change its position and that tends to be a long-term change. So our summers could be very wet or very dry, depending on which year.”
“With a geographic area of 1,558 square kilometers, the Houston area would have between about 12,500 and 15,580 cloud-to-ground lightning flashes in a typical year.” — John Jensenius National Weather Service lightning expert
See Lightning on page 4
Where on campus?
Stephen Fogg — THE BATTALION
Think you know every nook and cranny of Texas A&M? Test your campus know-how by e-mailing The Battalion and telling us where you think this photo was taken. The first people to get the answers correct will have their names published. Send your response with your name, class and major to photo@thebatt.com.
Monday’s answer: Bright Complex
Correct responses: Victor Vega, Class of 2006 Christina Lassen, senior mechanical engineering major J. Clayton Riley, senior interdisciplinary studies major Ralph Segars, infared thermographer, TAMU Physical Plant
Petroleum engineers cited for excellence ■ SPE earns international award for service to students Alex Worsham The Battalion The Texas A&M chapter of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, SPE, has been named the 2009 Outstanding Student Chapter for the North American region. The chapter will be recognized on Oct. 4 at the SPE Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition in New Orleans, La. “The award is given basically on what the chapter has done in charity work, and finding jobs and internships for students,” said graduate petroleum engineering student and SPE graduate student representative Arash Hagshenas. Before the award was distributed continentally, the Texas A&M SPE chapter received the global award. “It’s a huge deal to be recognized, and I think we’ve pretty much won it every other year for the past while,” said senior petroleum engineering major and SPE secretary Jeanna Easley. Chapter members were honored to have won the award again, See Award on page 4
7/6/09 10:40 PM