HOW COLD IS IT?

There's a chill in the air. But just how chilly should you be feeling?

For years weather forecasters have been relying on a wind-chill index that's based on 60-year-old polar research. Both common sense and many scientists, however, suggest that the formula's readings exaggerate the level of discomfort and danger of frostbite.

Last fall, students in one of Paul Funkenbusch's mechanical engineering classes decided to check it out for themselves.

Starting with a wind tunnel they built from metal ducts like those used to heat houses, the students placed the device inside a freezer, thereby creating a controlled environment unavailable to the early experimenters.

The students' results show the original formula to be indeed skewed. A couple of examples of the students' findings:

• 0 degrees and 15 MPH wind: -25F (old index, -31F)
• 20 degrees and 15 MPH wind: 8F (old index, -5F)

"There is now a move afoot (not provoked by our experiment but reinforced by it) for the Weather Service to revamp its model," Funkenbusch says.

And about time, too, he thinks. A native of Houghton, Michigan, in the very northern tip of the state, he's a wind-chill veteran.

"When I was a kid, we'd hear these scary-sounding numbers, but even as small children, we knew it was ridiculous. We knew if we went outside, we wouldn't freeze."

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