Christmas on the Summit

2017-12-26 22:21:05.000 – Adam Gill, Weather Observer/IT Specialist

Here at the Observatory, we operate 24/7 so some of us have to work for the holidays. This Christmas, it was Tom Padham, Caleb Meute, and I. Christmas on the summit is a quite few days with a little less work that all of us have to do. It is a nice break from normal summit life to be able to relax a bit and enjoy the weather. This year, we got plenty of snow on Christmas with 9 inches of snow falling! In the morning, the winds were very light and actually dropped to zero for a bit around 9am. Once the storm moved off into the Gulf of Maine, the winds picked up quickly getting to hurricane force by 2pm. The blowing snow was greatly reducing visibilities afternoon, to as little as 5 feet, as all the snow that had fallen in the light winds was suspended along with continued snowfall.

After 4pm, Tom got Christmas dinner started. I bought some steaks to bring up for everyone to have a good dinner and have something that we rarely have on the summit. We invited the State Park staff over as well since a few of them also stayed up on the summit for Christmas. The meal became more of a pot luck with State bringing over mashed potatoes, salad, and deviled eggs. We supplied the steaks and stuffing. I was going to make some vanilla ice cream for dessert but I forgot, though with how much we all ate, I don’t think anyone wanted any dessert! After dinner was finished, we watched some of the football games that were on and called family members to wish them a Merry Christmas!

Adam Gill, Weather Observer/IT Specialist