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NEW WEATHER STATION
(State College PA 3/20/98) - CASI HQ now has a new weather station which
updates to the Net every 30 minutes (see URL at bottom). This replaces
the Radio Shack WX-200 station which has become a backup station running
on our old computer. We are to thank Dave Heider of WeatherView
software for this new station. Not only did Dave rescue us from the
void of software for updating the WX-200 to the Net, he insisted that
CASI HQ should have a better weather station, and through Texas Weather
Instruments, he donated a $2500 TWI WRL-32SZ
(http://www.texas-weather.com/wrcover.htm) to CASI HQ. TWI has provided
their high-end weather stations to various interesting applications for
well-known clients such as the FAA and TWC.
(http://www.texas-weather.com/applic.htm)
The new TWI station has several advantages over the old WX-200,
including:
o Lightning Detection (counts per minute determined by a combination of
Number of Strikes and Proximity to the sensor)
o Solar Radiation Sensor
o Much better resolution and real time sample rate, for example:
Pressure Sensor -
OLD - 900 Seconds Sample / 0.03" Res.
NEW - < 1 Second (Real-Time) Sample / 0.001" Res.
Wind Speed Sensor -
OLD - 5 Seconds Sample
NEW - < 1 Second (Real-Time) Sample
Temperature / Moisture Sensor -
OLD - 10 Seconds Sample
NEW - < 1 Second (Real-Time) Sample
These specifications will allow for CASI HQ to closely monitor Mesoscale
events which pass over HQ this spring and summer, and will be useful
detecting things such as MesoLows or other inter-thunderstorm pressure
differences.
- Software Description - Dave's WeatherView software takes a screen
capture of the software screen and uploads it to the Internet, along
with an hourly text summary for the last 24 hours, every 30 minutes. He
is also considering (with my help) adding an HTML output to the
software. The screen is extremely configurable and currently has been
set up to include a Real-Time wind chart for the last several minutes,
various 24 hour graphs, and the last 4 hours of lightning detection.
The software can store or graph any amount of 1-minute data.
- Lightning Detection - The Lightning Detection got a test the first
night it was up as it detected thunderstorms in the D.C. area Friday as
0-8 strikes per minute. I was pleased to see that it picked up storms
at least 100 miles away and we'll see in the future how far away it can
pick up these strikes (the usual range for these instruments is 50-250
miles depending on where it is mounted). The lightning detector cannot
determine azimuth, distance or even number of strikes, but gives its
count based on proximity and strength of strikes.
- System Installation - The system is mounted on a collapsible 30-foot
steel pole attached to the porch here at my house... after much debate I
decided this was the only way to attach it on the property given that I
cannot make modifications to the house or property since I am only
renting, and also given that I will eventually move again and will have
to deconstruct it. It is installed in the ground and held to the deck
with several pipe clamps, metal strapping, and guy wires. It has built
in lightning protection which is connected to a copper grounding rod at
the base.
I'll be adding more information about the location and setup of this
weather station in the future; for now my main effort was to get the
weather data live online. If I can figure out how to do it I might also
add the Java LED Applet with current conditions.
- Sky Conditions Now Included - In addition to the new Weather Station,
I have written a script that includes the current sky conditions or
weather for the nearest NWS station. Knowing that my weather station
cannot detect sky conditions or precipitation, and that I cannot update
the page every hour, I set out to do the next best thing - grab them
from the nearest reporting station. The script saves the current NWS PA
hourly roundup from a university web server and parses out the
conditions for State College, or if State College is missing or
reporting "N/A" for conditions, parses out the conditions for Altoona.
These current sky conditions or weather are included in the CASI Live
Weather Station webpage via Server Side Includes (SSI). They have also
been added (along with a miniature output of the new Weather Station) to
the CASI Front Page at http://www.weatherwatchers.org/
The URL for the CASI HQ Live Weather Station (this is a CHANGE from the
old URL) is:
http://www.weatherwatchers.org/wxstation/liveobs.shtml
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VEHICLE #1 OUT OF COMMISSION THROUGH EARLY APRIL
(State College PA 3/10/98) - Vehicle #1, Jesse Ferrell's Storm
Investigation Vehicle, was involved in a major traffic accident February
25th 1998 in State College. No one was injured but the car was nearly
totalled. It is currently being repaired at Roan's Body Shop of State
College. Although it should be out of the shop this week, it will still
be unusable for Storm Investigation through early April as the
instruments and communications equipment will have to be reinstalled.
Vehicle #1's page (which hasn't been updated in a while) is at:
http://www.weatherwatchers.org/members/vehicle1.html
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CASI ANNOUNCES NEW MEMBER PAGES
(State College PA 3/23/98) - The Central Atlantic Storm Investigators
Website will announce early this week the availability of its new
Members Section, including up-to-date state maps of the locations of all
of the CASI Members pointing to individual Member Home Pages, which will
contain Contact and other information on the Members, in both a Public
section accessible by the entire WWW and a Private section entrusted to
CASI Members only. Another highlight of the section will be the Member
List which will incorporate Current Temperatures (nearest NWS) for each
Member's location.
The URL will be announced to the CASILIST and CASIADMIN list early this
week after final testing is completed.
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Jesse Ferrell - Meteorologist - j{at}weatherwatchers.org
Central Atlantic Storm Investigators - www.weatherwatchers.org
"A tornado? Why wasn't it dissipated by the weather
modification net?" --Jean-Luc Picard || ICQ No. 136862 ||