NULL 2009-11-27 14:11:57.000 - Mary Ellen Dunn,  Summit Intern Tip-Top in the Snow Conditions on the summit have certainly changed in the past 24 hours as a strong low pressure system has entered the region. The past few days we have been following this storm move up the Atlantic coast with the hopes of it bringing cold temperatures, accumulating snow, and high winds to the summit. November temperatures on Mount Washington have been above average with precipitation mainly rain so, wintry conditions are welcome and have been for a while. As the storm approached this morning, snow began to fall

NULL 2009-11-26 14:27:52.000 - Stacey Kawecki,  Observer and Meteorologist I think that says it all! Warning: The following passage may, in fact, become quite sappy. Thanksgiving is a national holiday. When we're small, it means eating a lot of food at the kid's table, and running under-foot while dads, uncles, and grandpa's watch football and drink beer and while moms, aunts, and grandma's putter around in the kitchen. As we entered kindergarten, we made paper turkeys and paper pilgrim hats and learned that it was a celebration of a new beginning. In middle school we were giving thanks to be

NULL 2009-11-25 16:38:43.000 - Brian Clark,  Observer and Meteorologist NULL As many of you already know, as summit staff we essentially work a week-on week-off schedule with Wednesday being the traditional shift change day. Something I noticed very quickly when I started working on the summit as an intern in January 2006 (has it really almost been 4 years?!) is that this schedule makes time fly by. I think it was former observer, 'Holywood' Jim Salge, that once said something like 'the days and weeks don't go by particularly fast, but the months sure do'. I have certainly found this

Why, November? 2009-11-24 23:29:00.000 - Ryan Knapp,  Staff Meteorologist Tonights view. When I started my meteorology classes in fall of 1999, the general meteorology classes had about 100 students or so in them. As the second semester came about, that number was cut in about half. But it wasn't until sophomore year that my peers started jumping ship left and right to engineering, computer science, physics or other majors. By the time I graduated, there was about seven of us, and that was considered a big class for my department. So why such a large drop off rate? Well, the

Dear Santa... 2009-11-22 18:32:22.000 - Ryan Knapp,  Staff Meteorologist A Christmas Sampler. Dear Santa-This year, I am starting a month earlier than usual since I am going on vacation but it also gives you some more time since I know you make most of your gifts, but some things just cannot be manufactured by your elves and I want to ensure you have time to surf the web. Plus, it will allow us to mail our letter to you the old fashion way instead of relying on email. As per your request last year when we provided you with NH's

Still Holding out for some INTENSE weather... 2009-11-21 20:26:00.000 - Will Tourtellot,  Summit Intern A Step In The Right Direction In yesterday's comment, Mike Finnegan brought to light the fact that many of the comments from this month have focused on the abnormal weather we've had on the summit. However I think that we've been experiencing all sorts of crazy weather events this month because people, including myself, have continued to write and talk about them. I, for one, don't want this erratic weather to continue and to that end, I have decided to enforce a ban on this subject.

The Difference a Day Makes 2009-11-20 16:10:46.000 - Mike Finnegan,  IT Observer The Difference a Day Makes A common topic for comments seems to be the uncommon weather we've been having for November. I will continue this trend today by relaying a story of yesterday. The morning began with a fine sunrise with visibility around 120 miles. There weren't many clouds to color up, but there was enough particulate in the atmosphere to form a mountain shadow. Alpineglow also painted the peaks to our north as the sun rose above the horizon. As the sun rose higher, the patchy valley

Unseasonable 2009-11-19 18:28:31.000 - Brian Clark,  Observer and Meteorologist Sunny and warm.Both are relative terms, one more than the other. Both are things that aren't always good in my opinion, again, one more than the other. Both are things that if I wanted all the time, I would move to southern California with my dad.These terms could also be used to describe the weather on the mountain so far this month. As far as sunshine goes, counting today we have seen four days with 100% of our possible sunshine minutes (minutes when a shadow is being cast) and 11 days

NULL 2009-11-18 05:56:01.000 - Nicole Moore,  Summit Volunteer Dig In! Well, if anyone was glued to the Webcam early afternoon on Sunday, they would haveseen me walking around and around the Observation Deck 15 times. We were in theclouds all day so it was not conducive to wandering around the summit. Unable to domy fairweather walk down the road to the Great Gulf overlook (my terminology), thelaps around the deck had to suffice!Mid-November and the cog is still coming to the summit twice a day, the road isstill clear and we drove all the way up in a van and

NULL 2009-11-17 06:13:18.000 - Stacey Kawecki,  Observer and Meteorologist NULL One of the side effects of constantly looking up at the clouds is a resulting curiosity about what lies beyond the weather. That vast, expansive, final frontier: space. The intrigue of space and the cosmos was ingrained into me as a young child. My father would sit me, my brother and sister down in front of the TV and put in a tape: The Cosmos, by Carl Sagan. Even back then, watching the stars, nebulae, and galaxies zoom across the television screen made me feel small and inconsequential (but only