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WILD WEATHER FORECASTS 2000-2001 WILD WEATHER FORECASTS 2000-2001 Astrometeorologist Jennifer Lawson predicts we're in for increasingly violent storms, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions over the next two years. ustralian-born Jennifer Lawson is a long-range weather forecaster who uses a system based on the principles of astrometeorology. Since her first public prognostication (tropical cyclone Pierre, 1985), her predictions of the dates and locations of tropical cyclones and storms have been published every year in the Australian media. In the United States, where she resides part-time in the Houston, Texas, area, she has been featured in the local media every year since 1988 with accurate predictions of the dates and locations of each season's hurricanes. Having no formal training in meteorology or long-range weather forecasting, Jennifer developed an interest in weather prediction after reading a small book on the subject in 1980. For five years she conducted research into planetary effects on weather patterns and the tropical cyclones which form every year in Australia's Coral Sea region. Through her observations, Jennifer concluded that the planets do have a major effect on altering weather patterns. In February 1985, Jennifer had her first predictions of summer storms and tropical cyclones published by Brisbane's Sunday Sun newspaper. She was successful in pinpoint- ing three out of four cyclones that formed in the Coral Sea that season, as well as 85 per cent of the summer storms. Subsequently, various Queensland newspapers published her tropical cyclone forecasts for every summer season, and Jennifer began to establish a proven track-record. Her greatest achievements in forewarning the public of fierce Coral Sea cyclones that would target the Queensland coast include TC Charlie in 1988 and TC Joy, the destructive cyclone that hit the far north coast in December 1990. With her cyclone forecasts for Australia proving successful, Jennifer, living part-time in Houston, had her list of hurricane dates and locations for the up and coming 1988 Atlantic hurricane season published in June 1988 in Houston's Uptown Express (Uptown Health and Spirit) magazine. Houston's Channel 2 Nearly Noon gave Jennifer a spot on the show where she predicted that in early September 1988 a fierce hurricane would move into the Gulf of Mexico. The fierce hurricane turned out to be Gilbert—a category-five storm which was so large it almost covered the Gulf of Mexico. The following June, in 1989, Jennifer appeared again on Nearly Noon, this time predicting that a fierce hurricane would target the South Carolina coast around September 20-22. Hurricane Hugo slammed into Charleston right on target. In 1992, Jennifer also predicted the date and formation of hurricane Andrew and that it would also target the US east coast. Jennifer Lawson has written her book, Violent Weather Predictions 2000-2001 (Llewellyn, 1999; see review this issue), primarily to forewarn the public as to when and where in the world severe weather patterns and earthquake and volcanic activity are likely to create havoc around the turn of the century. What follows is an interview with Jennifer (plus several inclusions from her book), in which she summarises some of her key predictions for 2000-2001. An interview with astrometeorologist Jennifer Lawson © 1999 Brisbane, Queensland, Australia E-mail: ms_jennifer_lawson@yahoo.com 1. How do you predict the weather? It's long-range weather, for a start, and not based on conventional methods of meteorol- ogy. The system I use is based on the fundamental principles of astrometeorology, which seeks to forecast weather by studying the angular positions of the Sun, Moon and planets in relation to each other and to the Earth. Their combined influences disrupt and disturb Earth's atmosphere, affecting our weather patterns. The celestial bodies’ declinations—their angular distance north or south of the Earth's equator—are just as important as longitude and latitude when determining long-term NEXUS © 15 FEBRUARY — MARCH 2000