Rarely before the 1980s did a scientific issue jump from the corridors of research to the halls of international diplomacy in less than a decade. Such was the case when a profound threat to the Antarctic’s protective layer of stratospheric ozone became apparent.

The biggest swarm of tornadoes ever recorded—148 in all—rumbled across the U.S. Midwest and South on 3–4 April 1974.

The periodic cooling of the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean helps bring rain to Alaska and blizzards to Colorado.

NCAR’s Mesa Laboratory saw thousands of comings and goings in its first few years, but only one arrival needed a new room to accommodate it.

For all the blazing glory of the visible Sun, it’s the outer atmosphere, or corona—far hotter than the interior, yet invisible to the naked eye—that most intrigued solar scientists during NCAR’s first years