Hmmmmm, I suppose today is Valentine's Day... Meh ;-) I'm currently single, so luckily I won't be spending tons of money on gifts and an overpriced diner, hehe. I hope all the couples out there do have a good time tonight. Also, HAPPY ANNIVERSARY MOM AND POPS!
Anyways, let me discuss my weather watching equipment, techniques, and sources. I own a Davis Vantage Pro2 wireless weather station. The outdoor unit has a large rain gauge, an anemometer with a wind vane, a radiation shield covering a temperature sensor and a humidity sensor, and a transponder with a solar panel for power (and it also has a battery backup). The console is located in my bedroom connected to a wireless router/modem (Verizon FiOS). The console displays all data recieved from the outdoor unit, such as current outdoor and indoor temp, outdoor and indoor humidity, outdoor dewpoint, windchill, heat index, wind speed and direction, wind gust, 10 min. avg speed, barometric pressure with trend, rain total, rain rate, rain totals for the current storm, the month, and the year, current sky conditions, moon phase, sunrise/sunset time. You can check highs and lows for each reading for the day, month, year, and all time. You can also set alarms for each reading, for example, you could set the alarm to go off when the outdoor temp hits 100*, or when the wind gusts to 30 mph or more, or for when it starts registering rain. It also gives you a general 12 hour forecast based on pressure trends, temp trends, dewpoint trends, and wind speed and direction. All very very cool.
To get the most out of the Vantage Pro2, you need the Weather Link IP and software. This is a device connected to the console, which allows you to connect the console to your home network via ethernet cable. The ethernet cable is conected to your router, which does 2 things. First, after you install the software on your computer, the software will find the station on your home network so you can download all of the data collected on the console (which archives data for several weeks worth of readings) and you can set the time interval at which the console records and stores readings. Every 15 minutes is what I use. On a side note, the readings on the console itself are updated every 3 seconds to 1 minute. Once you download the archived data to you pc, you can use the software to create reports for a week, a month, or a year. You can export the data into an excel spreadsheet to create a complete record of all of the readings at 15 minute intervals. From this, you can determine all time highs and lows (for a week, a month, a year, since you bought it...), make charts and graphs, look for trends, the list goes on and on.
The second thing the Weather Link IP does is use the connection to the router to transmit the data to a website that shows your readings, updated every minute. The website can be accessed anywhere on any computer with an internet conection. The site is
Weather Link Home Page . From here, you create a profile and a station name (mine is 'smearedblackink') and you get your own page dedicated to your station with unlimited access and constant updates. My station site is
my station site . From the site, you can also view a global map that pinpoints every station on the network and you can see their data as well. There is no fee either, just the one time purchase of the weather Link IP for around $195.
An example of how I can use it during or before a storm, is that I can watch the wind speed and direction (telling me if warm southerly or cool northerly winds are blowing). I can watch the pressure to see if the low is getting closer/stronger by watching the trend and how fast it is falling. I can compare the actual temp to the dewpoint, to see if it is too dry to start snowing, and if the temp will drop enough as the air moistens to allow snow to fall, as the actual temp moves toward the dewpoint temp, and how much the temp will drop as the air moistens and
evapotranspiration occurs.
Right now, I have almost a year's worth of data (bought it and set it up on March 26th, 2009). The simple text file for all of that data is 2.7 megabytes! The excel spreadsheet has 20,673 rows and 28 columns of data categories! Wow! That is a lot of info. But, the weather link software allows you to export reports for an individual month, or year, and the reports can be done to show the daily statistics, rather than an entry for every 15 minutes. It also can break the data down and give stats on a particular month.
That's all for now. I'll update my thoughts on the impending storm for tomorrow and Tuesday.
Current Wx Observations: 4:53PM 2/14/2010
Temp: 42*
Wind: NNE 1 mph
Humidity: 39%
Dewpoint: 18*
Barometer: 1006.5 mb Steady
Precip: None
Sky Condition: Clear
12 Hour Forecast: Mostly Cloudy, Snow Possible in 12 hours
