Highs and lows 2009-08-27 16:49:05.000 - Ryan Knapp,  Staff Meteorologist 130 mile sunrise w/ upper atmosphere orange glow. From the highest of highs to the lowest of lows, my résumé of experienced weather is constantly in transition while working here. In the past, I probably would have used some sort of weather journal to track this, scratching out the old data and replacing it with the new. With how variable the weather is up here, that method would eventually make my entries look sloppy and full of black scratch outs. Thankfully the digital age has allowed me to type it

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE WEATHER, THE PEOPLE AND THIS PLACE 2009-08-26 17:50:24.000 - Jane Kellogg,  Summit Volunteer Rainbow As OBS volunteer this week, I'm sure my experience has been typical to that of many others when volunteering for the first time. You learn more about weather and the work of meteorologists. You gain a better understanding of the entire MWOBS organization and all they're doing as they maintain the summit traditions of weather recording and forcasting, while at the same time continue to expand their mission. You experience the alpine environment with its sublime, quiet moments; rapid weather changes; fury

Voted off the mountain 2009-08-25 17:34:25.000 - Scott Wehrwein,  Summit Intern NULL As detailed in this week's ObsCast, the summit staff on my shift has decided to vote me off the mountain. Although my departure was inevitable, I find myself wishing I didn't have to go. When I began to think about how to write my final comment, my first instinct was to go back and look at my photographs from throughout the summer. Thinking back on my anticipation for the photo oportunities on the summit, I decided that I'm pretty pleased with the results. Looking back at some of

First week 2009-08-24 17:27:56.000 - Mary Ellen Dunn,  Summit Intern The observatory building at night. My first week at the Observatory is almost through and I still can't believe I am here. Waking up on top of a 6,288 ft. mountain everyday is kind of surreal. The views of the Presidential Mountains, when not in the fog, are absolutely beautiful and the weather has already been pretty exciting, with a thunderstorm on Friday. Everyone here is great. They have been a lot of fun and have been helpful through the intern training process. Being the fall intern, I am anticipating

The Real Obs 2009-08-23 11:41:59.000 - Stacey Kawecki,  Observer and Meteorologist NULL Reality Television is the world's greatest oxymoron. The simple fact is, what we consider reality TV, isn't real at all. Now, I'm not trying to belittle the entertainment value of reality TV. I too have fallen victim to Iron Chef and American Idol. I'm merely pointing out that it is not, by any means, representative of real-life situations. It is representative of a producer who thought, 'Gee, wouldn't it be fun to put a bunch of people who would never live together in a big house and see

Severe Wx! 2009-08-22 05:26:04.000 - Mike Carmon,  Staff Meteorologist NULL Yesterday was one of those days on the summit when I was reminded why I am in this profession in the first place. I was downstairs just waking up around 2:30 PM EST when Steve came down and told me that the radar was looking rather interesting. I hustled up into the weather room, still half asleep, to find everyone staring at either the computer screen or out the windows. Glancing at the radar, I quickly finished the waking-up process and became quite excited. The screen before me was littered

Tour of the new septic system and a run-in with The Presence 2009-08-21 09:42:22.000 - Scott Wehrwein,  Summit Intern Important Signage Anyone who's been to the summit during the winter months knows that the summit staff has to be rather careful about how much water is used. Although we have well access to as much clean water as we need, any water we use has to be stored in tanks because the leach fields for our summer septic system are frozen.This summer, however, construction has been happening on a new septic system designed to process our waste water year round

Final Days Comment 2009-08-18 18:09:21.000 - Alex Jacques,  Summit Intern One final good sunset. Well, all things come to end, and for me it's my internship here on the summit that will be concluding this Wednesday.In a nutshell, here is a list of things I have done while on the summit: removed cables, cleaned and replaced windows, the morning routine, learned how to take observations, museum training and work, tour shadowing, tours themselves, B16 entries recent and old, chopped concrete, filmed and created ObsCasts, wrote and recorded forecasts, cleaned the bottom of the Observatory Tower, took down and replaced instruments

Hedda's Last Week 2009-08-17 15:33:47.000 - Hedda Peterson,  Summit Intern Brian missing... :( Having worked in numerous cafes, restaurants, a country store, climbing gym, and as a babysitter and even a window washer, I have always considered myself fairly well rounded when it came to the working world of an undergraduate. Five weeks ago, prior to my first week on the summit as an intern, I doubted this confidence for the first time. I was not sure what my job as an intern would entail. I was a little concerned when in the interview I was asked how my plumbing

Valley Link is Down! 2009-08-15 11:39:42.000 - Brian Clark,  Observer and Meteorologist NULL For unknown reasons, the microwave radio connection from the summit to our Weather Discovery Center in North Conway is currently down. This link supplies those of us on the summit with access to the Internet which we use to send our observations to the National Weather Service and forecast, among many other things. That link is also responsible for allowing us to update these observer comments(I'm currently using my personal iPhone to write this update) and for supplying this website with current conditions on the summit as