Tuesday -- January 27, 2015; Futures Plummet -- Probably On CAT, BTU News

I'm not there so I don't know but the news out of NYC this morning suggests the "storm" is much less than what was forecast 24 hours ago. Link here.

However, the science is settled on the forecast for global temperatures to rise by 1 degree 100 years from now according to Agore who has honorary degrees in climatology, meteorology, oceanography, and sciencetology.

“My deepest apologies to many key decision makers and so many members of the general public,” [meteorologist-in-charge at the National Weather Service in Mt. Holly, New Jersey] tweeted. “You made a lot of tough decisions expecting us to get it right, and we didn’t. Once again, I’m sorry.”

But we stand by "the one degree more in 100 years" forecast. 

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Active rigs:

	1/27/2015	01/27/2014	01/27/2013	01/27/2012	01/27/2011
Active Rigs	156	187	190	204	164

RBN Energy: will the NGL surplus and cheap oil derail export plans?

For those who missed it, yesterday's NDIC daily activity report starting with all the PNC wells certainly caught my eye.

Reporting today:

• Big miss: Peabody Energy (BTU), expectation, - 35 cents; The company's net loss attributable to common stockholders narrowed to $514.6 million, or $1.92 per share, in the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, from $565.7 million, or $2.12 per share, a year earlier. The results fell short of Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for a loss of 36 cents per share.
• Big miss: Caterpillar (CAT), expectation, $1.55, Caterpillar took a hit in the fourth quarter from restructuring costs and the heavy machinery maker issued a weak outlook for 2015, citing the tumbling price of commodities. Shares slumped more than 7 percent Tuesday before the markets opened. Caterpillar earned $757 million, or $1.23 per share, for the three-month period. A year earlier the Peoria, Illinois, company earned $1 billion, or $1.54 per share.
• Apple (AAPL), expectation, $2.59, crushes expectations. See this post.
• AT&T (T), expectation, 55 cents, posts slight beat;The second-largest U.S. wireless carrier posted a net loss of $4 billion, or 77 cents per share, in the fourth quarter, compared with net income $6.9 billion, or $1.31 per share, a year ago.
  Shares in AT&T were up 2 percent in after-hours trading after closing at $32.81 on the New York Stock Exchange. AT&T said it had added more than 2 million new wireless customers and 854,000 contract subscribers in the quarter.
• Canadian National Railway (CNR.TO), expectation, 97 cents; earnings up; raises dividend;
  
  Net income rose to C$844 million ($681 million), or C$1.03 a share, from C$635 million, or 76 Canadian cents, a year earlier. Revenue rose to C$3.21 billion from C$2.75 billion. The railway boosted its quarterly dividend by 25 percent, to 31.25 Canadian cents per common share.

See disclaimer.

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A Note To The Granddaughters

This is really cool. I saw the asteroid last night. JPL/NASA is reporting:

Scientists working with NASA's 230-foot-wide Deep Space Network antenna at Goldstone, California, have released the first radar images of asteroid 2004 BL86.

The images show the asteroid, which made its closest approach on Jan. 26, 2015 at 11:19 a.m. EST at a distance of about 745,000 miles (3 times the distance from Earth to the moon), has its own small moon.

The 20 individual images used in the movie were generated from data collected at Goldstone on Jan. 26, 2015. They show the primary body is approximately 1,100 feet across and has a small moon approximately 230 feet across.

In the near-Earth population, about 16 percent of asteroids that are about 655 feet or larger are a binary (the primary asteroid with a smaller asteroid moon orbiting it) or even triple systems (two moons). The resolution on the radar images is 13 feet per pixel.

The trajectory of asteroid 2004 BL86 is well understood. Monday's flyby was the closest approach the asteroid will make to Earth for at least the next two centuries. It is also the closest a known asteroid this size will come to Earth until asteroid 1999 AN10 flies past our planet in 2027.

I can't believe the luck. Last night the weather in the Dallas-Ft Worth area was very, very warm. I was able to lay down (lie down) on the grass and stare at the heavens.

Second, the skies were absolutely clear; no clouds.

Finally, the best viewing time according to the note above was 11:00 p.m. ET according to earlier reports for this area. I wanted to see if Letterman would be live despite the snowstorm in NYC, so I had a 30-minute window from 10:00 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. to look for the asteroid.

We were told that the asteroid would be seen "between Jupiter and Gemini." Earlier in the day I had checked the sky charts (a dynamic link; different now than it was yesterday) and it was going to be easy to find Jupiter. Find the moon, go to the left, find Orion (probably the easiest constellation in the northern sky) and then continue left on that same line toward a very bright object: Jupiter.  Above Jupiter and way to the left of Orion was Gemini.

I've never really been able to find Gemini in the past (because I was never all that serious about looking for it) but last night it was easy to find. And there, between Gemini and Jupiter, two bright objects, one of which would have been the asteroid.

And if it wasn't, I'll never know. As far as I'm concerned I saw the asteroid. I'm glad I caught it: I probably won't be around two centuries from now to see it again. By that time global warming will have destroyed the earth, the earth being two degrees warmer then than it is now.

And, yes, despite the storm, Letterman was "live." Fallon, also from NYC, was not "live" -- it was a taped re-run.