Wednesday, November 29, 2006 - 12:10AM

Winter storm chasing and the 'Warm Wedge'

By DAN ROBINSON

Editor/Photographer

From Dan: How the crime of copyright infringement took $1 million from me and brought down my business.

I've lost more than $1 million to copyright infringement in the last 15 years, and it's finally brought an end to my professional storm chasing operation. This page is a detailed account of the biggest threat to my photography and video operation that I had to battle daily to just barely survive, and eventually could not overcome. It's a problem facing all of my colleagues as well.

The forecast model roller coaster lives year-round, not just during the spring storm chasing season. A big winter storm has been suggested by the various models to hit the midwest, anywhere from a St. Louis - Chicago - Indianapolis - Cleveland region. Precip forecasts range from a foot or more of snow, an inch or so of snow, glaze ice, or just rain. With the models all over the place, it is hard to tell what to make of the upcoming week.

The worst of any such snow/ice storm will remain out of my chase range. However, I'll consider a one or two hour drive west or northwest into Kentucky or Ohio Friday night, if it looks like West Virginia is going to suffer from the dreaded 'warm wedge' that keeps these types of snow events from reaching Charleston. The 'warm wedge' effect is simply the mountains blocking in a layer of warm air near the surface even after the cold front passes, keeping areas on the immediate west side of the Appalachians in the liquid precip (rain) mode. Last year, a similar system necessitated a drive west to Morehead and Vanceburg, Kentucky to get into snow.

We may even have some severe weather prospects on Thursday night into Friday, but climatology keeps me from getting too excited. As always, it's worth keeping an eye on nonetheless.