There’s been a lot of interest in this station from my post on “pipes”. Finding it from Google Earth has been a challenge since the lat/lon provided by meteorological agencies is rather coarse.
A number of commenters, especially Jeff C. and George M. have zeroed in with the help of land photos they’d discovered, such as this one from a travel company that offers trips to the “pole of cold”:
Another image of the brown wood slat covered building which houses the office is here:
Click for larger image
Note the two pole barns in the distance from the Stevenson Screen photo and the field of view. It seems that we have located the station in the far northeast side of town at 67.565°N 133.413°E Here is the corresponding Google Earth image with my addition of the field of view lines:
Click for a larger image
A live Google Earth for this image is here
It appears that the original meteo station office, seen below with the quad Yagi satellite antenna on it, has been replaced with the newer one above that has a dish antenna. The new office can be seen in the background left of this photo:
Direct URL to the photo above here
What is curious is the plume in the left of the frame. It appears to be steam but could be smoke, we’ll never know for sure.
I’ve also been able to obtain the raw daily data for Verhojansk.
Which has four readings per day at six hour intervals, plus the Tmax and Tmin Temperature. I’ve placed the text file on my surfacestations.org server for anyone that wishes to do an analysis and compare it to the same period for HadCRUT or GISS.
Here is the GISTEMP plot, there does appear to be a positive trend since about 1980:
Fighting a massive cold and work duties preclude me from doing any decent analysis now, but given the interest level, I’m making it available to anyone that wants to give it a go. Even though the data set is only 8 years long, there may be something interesting to discover. This short raw data set has not been processed by GHCN whereas the GISTEMP data has been.
Link: VerhojanskDaily Data (ASCII text file 1.1 MB) to save to a file, do a right click and “save target as”
Link: Verhojansk GISTEMP Monthly Data (ASCII text file 17KB)
Not that I’m complaining or anything but looking at the GISS temperature map Alberta is an area where we suppose to be at or below normal temperatures for October but you guessed it for us October was much warmer including record breaking temperatures the first two days of the month.
Go figure.
Mr. Watts and all who use Google Earth:
http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article5182639.ece
“The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro)…will roll-out a rival to Google Earth…by the end of the month…will allow users to zoom into areas as small as 10 metres wide, compared to the 200 metre wide zoom limit on Google Earth.”
This may allow more armchair station surveying!
Anthony,
Longtime lurker. Really enjoy your site. Found some interesting attributes in the raw Verhojansk data. Appears there was some sort of instrumentation switch in June of 2004 — two data lines (db_id 2 and db_id 3) appear for each date between May 1 and June 15. Further note that the daily record of minimum (Tn) and maximum (Tx) temperatures disappear after June 15, 2004. I had thought that global mean temperatures were based on the mean of daily min and max temps. How does GISTEMP calculate annual mean temp in the absence of recorded minimum and maximum temps? Could the apparent change in equipment or a shift in how monthly mean temperatures are calculated have contributed to the apparent spike in temperature between 2004 and 2008 in the GISTEMP graph?
John
REPLY: John, I suspected a change about then also, because I see a step change in the GISTEMP graph about then. The lack of max/mins is handled by NOAA using the FILNET program, which uses an interpolation scheme from nearby station data. GISS doesn’t do infilling as far as I know. – Anthony
The following page shows temperature graphs for Verhojansk (link).
Data from HOAA and HadCRU.
The graph of monthly data indicates cooling summers and warming winters.
The final graph on the page compares Verhojansk with Ojmjakon, which has a very similar trend over the last 50 years.
Another perspective of the original meteo station office in your 4th photo.
I see that others have already commented on this post from within the panorimo site, but thought I’d add it just in case:
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/8225894
Black carbon in soil underestimated and hence global warming models overpredict GW
http://www.physorg.com/news146244148.html
But is co2 already at a tipping point?
http://www.physorg.com/news146243162.html
Caveat: It is Hansen of GISS claiming this. No surprise.
In the paper they say that we can reduce CO2 50ppm by “reforestation of degraded land and use of more natural fertilizers.” Shouldn’t those be goals already, regardless of AGW?
And as for energy efficiency:
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/21666/?a=f
there are seven stations used to create the records for this site
“an interpolation scheme from nearby station data”: is that ‘nearby’ in the technical sense of ‘may be hundreds of miles away’?
Thank you for this great blog.
I found a Russian site that has the following:
Verhojanskij Perevoz (63°19’N 132°01’E)
http://meteo.infospace.ru/wcarch/html/r_day_stn.sht?stn=1388
Available date range 1998 – 2004
Verhojansk (67°33’N 133°23’E)
http://meteo.infospace.ru/wcarch/html/r_day_stn.sht?num=128
Available date range 1998 – 2004
It allows to download archives in csv text files if you click the floppy disk icon next to “Данные с метеостанции”.
I am a native Russian speaker, let me know if you need any assistance with this.
The “new” building was surely in use in 2005 – at the page
http://www.roshydromet.ru/txt/photo010405.htm
that was discussed under the “pipes” article, the participants at the celebration of the 120th anniversary of the coldest temp record are standing together with the meteo personnel before the new building. I thought that it was maybe the town museum, but it is not:
http://www.roshydromet.ru/images/010405/2782.jpg
If there will be a global survey of the Waldo region in Siberia, here’s some more pics for a start.
I made a search through Russian search portals and found a photo of Oymyakon station, which is actually in 30 km distant Tomtor, probably near the local airport. The text under the photo says that the authors were allowed to visit the town from Moscow, but not from Yakutian authorities, but they visited anyway. The authors also comment that the winters in 90’s were mild, temps going down hardly under 59 C…
http://nera.belmt.ru/photo/finn1/10.htm
And here is a Finnish page with pics of Tomtor and its station:
http://www.ursa.fi/~riikonen/Siberia/
The last historical photo shows Ms. Kisileva (who worked at various Siberian stations in the 50’s and 60’s) at the Oymyakon station.
http://www.sciencereview.ru/popov/kisileva/7.jpg
From the site linked by EW, more of those troubling wires:
http://www.ursa.fi/~riikonen/Siberia/pages/Tomtor%20moon%2022%20halo.htm
In January, it would that be that dark around mid-day wouldn’t it? That far north, perhaps lights inside the screens are a necessity during the winter months so that the oberver can see due to the nearly perpetual darkness. I wonder if a screen design incorporating lights is/was a Siberian standard prior to moving to an automated system. I also imagine it would take a minute or two for the observer’s eyes to adjust in order to take the readings right next to a glowing light bulb, having just trudged about 50 (SWAG) meters in the near dark – long enough to heat things up a bit.
These images beg a whole host of questions, don’t they? And then there’s Mosher’s interesting comment above about using 7 different sites for the one record.
This is off topic but should be a good fodder for another post.
Obama promises leadership on climate change
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-11-18-obama-climate-change_N.htm?csp=34
The video is very scary but even more frightful is the statement “But Obama could begin to tackle global warming without Congress through administrative actions.” Someone should tell Mr. Obama the science is NOT “beyond dispute” and that most of the “facts” he regurgitates from Al Gore’s “A Convinient Lie” have also been refuted.
Why the requirement for man-made forests? In the interest of historical environmentalism, shouldn’t we be burning Iowa every year so as to restore the prairie grass environment? California is leading the way in restoring their fire-cleared savanna.
Some people would find 59 C rather distressing.
evanjones (19:26:35) : Said
“Not less than 6 peer review studies have shown these issues may account for up to 50% of the warming since 1900.
I know of two of those studies: McKitrick/Michaels nd LaDochy (both Dec. 2007). But what are the other four?
Anyone? I’d really like to get them.”
I have picked up the publication from ICECA.US
Maybe you can ask them because they provided the comment.
B.C:
For your information reindeer are not kept in barns.
Even just a few miles away can be very different in terms of weather and climate. It’s all about topography.
Interestingly whilst GISS is reporting a positive temperature anomoly over Siberia, the “Times (19/11/08)” Weather Eye, reports that the Siberian town of Oymyakon had a low of -47C this week. Apparently “several degrees below normal”.
Don Keiller,
Cambridge,
UK
I’m intrigued by the immense temperature rise that occured in the mid to late 1880s.
I could understand a fall there, possibly caused by Krakatau’s 1883 erruption, but a rise of such magnitude is surely improbable?
Pole barns commonly store hay. I’d suspect reindeer feed.
===================
Don Keiller (10:14:03) :
“Interestingly whilst GISS is reporting a positive temperature anomoly over Siberia, the “Times (19/11/08)” Weather Eye, reports that the Siberian town of Oymyakon had a low of -47C this week. Apparently “several degrees below normal”.”
Don’t forget that Siberia covers a very large area. Local anomolies also occur commonly, for instance the USA on any given day will have record lows and highs for a particular day somewhere or other.
At least you know now it wasn’t the pipes. Those screens look pretty well sited too, even category 1 perhaps. I’d also suspect it may have been the photographer who put the light in the box in order to get a better photo. Photographers do these kinds of things. In any event a bulb wouldn’t affect a mercury thermometer reading unless it was left on for a little while, which is unlikely, since It takes all of 2 seconds to get the reading and write it down. Even if it is actually there and is on constantly, that would show in the data as a step change, not a continuous rise. Back to the drawing board I think.
REPLY: Actually it could still very well be pipes…depending on prevailing winds and the amount of BTU’s dumped in the town by the heating system and open windows due to no regulation, there may very well be a UHI heat plume that extends to the station.
What we need to find out is what the prevailing wind direction is and its average magnitude. This may yield a clue. – Anthony
Anthony, it’s been very interesting to see the Verhoyansk station get located and pretty amazing to see how public information can be utilized. There is way more leverage on non-US data than US data. It would be particularly worthwhile to get first hand information on other very high leverage Russian stations. I’m in the processing of collating a list of stations that contribute to GHCN updates (it’s much smaller than the entire network and actually smaller than USHCN) and I’ll send you the list in a day or two.
REPLY: I feel a vodka and borscht run coming on. – Anthony
I argued long and hard with Ray Ladbury on RC about the significance of your photos, especially the ones with air conditioners, so I’m certainly not anti. But a hot pipe a hundred yards away in an environment of -40 is really pushing it. With a strong wind in the right direction you might get a rise of a fraction of a degree. But then again, any wind out there in Winter would probably have a very severe cooling effect. And you’re looking for several degrees of anomaly. I don’t see it. And I’ve been as skeptical of that Russian data as anyone else in the past. Frankly it’s always looked like Russian data was pushing the entire global warming trend but now that I see their stations are quite good I’m beginning to wonder. And Russians have nothing to gain by data manipulation since they are more pro-oil than anyone and their scientists are mostly extremely skeptical. The old argument about scientists putting in colder data in the past to squeeze money out of the Soviet regime isn’t credible either since it’s quite clear they got free heating. And even if they hadn’t they’d have risked being shot or sent to a Gulag for that. I’m pretty sure they’d put on their furry hats and go out there in -40 to faithfully collect the correct data day after day. I certainly would have in their shoes.
REPLY: I’m not suggesting single pipes 100 yards away are the big difference to what happens inside the screen. What I AM suggesting is that we have a significant city-wide active UHI driven by a power/steam/hot water plant.
Let’s say you have a steam/hot water plant that puts out 5 megawatts, which given the size of the power plant I see in the photos, (the building with blue roof here) it could be a reasonable guess…thanks to the piping system, that heat dissipates over the entire town. In a small town like this, that gives a fairly well concentrated heat source. It doesn’t matter if the pipes are buried or above ground, the heat will dissipate into the area.
Wind will distort the heat plume downwind, as we’ve seen from other UHI studies. So even a weather station on the edge of town (as this one is) could be affected.
As a benchmark, look at this site, Cordova Alaska, a town about the same size, which has a 7 megawatt capable plant:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2007/12/10/how-not-to-measure-temperature-part-45/
Now look at the size of the Russian town – a couple of square miles, dissipate 5 megawatts over a couple of square miles…that is bound to raise the local air temperature some.
Back of the envelope calcs: 2 (square miles) = 5,179,976.22 square meters or about a forcing of 1 watt per square meter. That is significant.
So if this city wide dissipated heat means the regular difference between -30C and -25C for example, a 5C anomaly will show up as bright red in the GISTEMP analysis, but it will still be bitterly cold…there will be no visible effects, snow and ice will still stay in place (except maybe over/under heat pipes).
Then there is humidity. Depending on how much water is lost from the system in the area can also be a factor. As we know from Christy’s study of the San Jaquin Valley, extra night time humidity can effect Tmin Again with a lot of water vapor being put into the air that may affect the temperatures. Note the plume in one photo on the left side within the station viewshed.
UHI from waste heat and waste water vapor doesn’t have to be “warm” to create an anomaly, and we are talking about temperature anomalies here that are subzero. Without some good data on the powerplant, the town, and the state of the system it will be hard to pin down exactly. But, as they say on Mythbusters: “I think it’s plausible” that we have a UHI effect in Verhojansk.
Here is one place where modeling could actually do something useful…model the town, the power, etc and see where the waste heat goes and how much it raises the air temp. – Anthony