German Trip

2008-03-01 17:59:24.000 – Steve Welsh,  IT Observer

Auto Road At Cow Pasture

For several years now the Observatory has played host, each winter season, to a group of students from Ruhr University in Bochum, Germany. They spend a week up here and work on a variety of weather and climatologically related projects. This year they were over for a week in early January with their leader Dr Andreas Pflitsch. For the first time Andreas is also bringing over a group from the University of Essen and right on schedule they arrived in the US yesterday. The plan was for them to head up to the summit this Sunday for their week long stay. However, since we are expecting high winds and lots of blowing snow on Sunday they tried to ascend Mt Washington this morning. Unfortunately the Bombardier Snow Cat, after a good attempt, had to turn back due to zero visibility. I can imagine the disappointment of those on board, especially after spending a couple of hours being thrown and bumped around in a cramped cabin. When things like this happen it makes you realize just how isolated you can be living on top of a mountain. Let us hope they make it up soon.

Anyway the past two days have been amongst the clearest, calmest and best conditions I have seen this winter. We experienced some great views, sunsets and a perfect sunrise. The fox and raven were also around at times too. Reality set back in today as we returned to fog, snow, blowing snow and digging.

The picture was taken on Thursday afternoon by Matt Morin and shows the auto road at Cow Pasture looking up towards Ball Crag. For those who have driven up in the summer you can see that it looks a little different now.

Steve Welsh,  IT Observer