Watts Up With That?

In a little over a year into the www.surfacestation.org project, volunteers have surveyed about 600 stations now, roughly half of the 1221 USHCN climate network. One of the things I had hoped for would be finding more CRN1 and CRN2 rated stations as the Midwest has been surveyed. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be happening, and the number of CRN1/2 stations just isn’t climbing much.

I’m about to publish a significant update to the surfacestations rating, I’m way behind in that work, but have been monitoring new stations, so look for that soon.

Last week I had an inquiry from Frank Perdicaro about a weather station in Los Angeles County, Cogswell reservoir, that looked like it had the potential to be a really well sited station. Situated in the mountains east of the LA basin, it was “miles from everything”, about 6 miles NE of the Mount Wilson observatory, and the road to it was closed to vehicle traffic. It also had a long record. It is a station operated by the Los Angeles Water District, which manages the reservoir.

To see it, you had to hike or bike to get there, because 9/11 closed access to a lot of reservoirs, such as Fairmont, which is a USHCN station that I previously surveyed, but could only do it from aerial photos. I wanted to see what Cogswell looked like, so I put out a call for help on this blog to get it surveyed. Readers Jason Salit and Hyon Min responded, and after discussion as to who was best suited for the job, Hyon hiked up last Sunday to survey the station.

First let us look at where the station is situated on Google Earth:

Cogswell Reservoir is the yellow marker – click for larger image

From a map and satellite image perspective, the station looks quite remote, being in the rugged mountains of the Los Angeles National Forest:

Click for larger image

Google Earth live link is here

But thanks to Hyon, we get a completely different view from the ground: Read the rest of this entry »

By Jonathan Leake, Times Online, UK

Britain’s great seafaring tradition is to provide a unique insight into modern climate change, thanks to thousands of Royal Navy logbooks that have survived from the 17th century onwards.

The logbooks kept by every naval ship, ranging from Nelson’s Victory and Cook’s Endeavour down to the humblest frigate, are emerging as one of the world’s best sources for long-term weather data. The discovery has been made by a group of British academics and Met Office scientists who are seeking new ways to plot historic changes in climate.

“This is a treasure trove,” said Dr Sam Willis, a maritime historian and author who is affiliated with Exeter University’s Centre for Maritime Historical Studies.

“Ships’ officers recorded air pressure, wind strength, air and sea temperature and other weather conditions. From those records scientists can build a detailed picture of past weather and climate.” Read the rest of this entry »