Recovering from cold... 2007-03-01 09:17:32.000 - Jim Salge,  Observer Sunset From the Tucks Trail... A story and slideshow on the Mount Washington Observatory is on the AP newswire today:Click here to read it!March 1st, the end of meteorological winter! The staff today will be working feverously summarizing February’s data, as well as error checking and analyzing. Preliminary looks have this past month ranking number two behind February of 1968 as the coldest of all time, with an average temperature of below -3F. It also looks like, pending more review, that it was the sixth coldest month on record at the

Fun In Nice Weather 2007-02-28 10:22:18.000 - Jon Cotton,  Observer Sunrise Smokes Plumes As you know from the Obscast, there is a fair bit of news to conclude our shift week. (Hold up. The Obscast is a weekly video blog produced by the summit staff. We talk, explain, show and jest in a moving picture format. It's really great. And it is a benefit of membership. This week's Obscast even included a snippet of pirate behavior. When have you even seen pirate behavior in the Comments here? Truly video allows us to expand our communal horizons - our's, your's, everyone's.

Eleventy One One Day 2007-02-25 07:39:43.000 - Jon Cotton,  Observer Sometimes sunset looks like this Another quiet morning on the mountain, except this time it snowed upward.The best way to describe the overnight was 'mostly clear'. Humidity was 85-90% from yesterday on through. Western undercast conditions slowly dissipated after midnight. But just about every hour, there was either light fog blowing over the summit or an even thinner band of cloud wafting a couple hundred feet above the tower. Occasionally, visibility would be reduced to official fog definitions of 5/8 statue miles or less but 110 miles was the norm.

A quiet morning... 2007-02-24 08:29:17.000 - Neil Lareau,  Observer NULL A quiet morning on the mountain: Better than half the crew is sick this morning and with yesterday’s Edutrip and Radio hosts now departed the morning is comparatively quiet. The winds are still strong enough to create some rumbling and hissing, but I’ve become so accustomed to this noise that it just blends into the ambient auditory landscape. Temperatures have been on a bit of a roller coaster ride; up to 13, down to -16, back to 9 all less than 24 hours. We are currently warming up on a

WOKQ Live on the Rockpile 2007-02-23 08:33:31.000 - Jon Cotton,  Observer WOKQ, The Morning Waking Crew WOKQ, the Big 97.5, is live on the Rockpile this morning! WOKQ has quite a lot of history up here on the summit. If you're a regular listener you know they broadcast from the peak at 103.7FM. If you're a visitor to the summit, you've spotted one of their antennas towers. Folks from the station come up now and then for maintenance on the transmitters. We at the Observatory record a current conditions report every weekday for the Morning Waking Crew. Well, this morning

Thoughts from a volunteer... 2007-02-20 17:04:26.000 - Barbara McKeon,  Summit Volunteer More blowing snow... The world on top of Mt. Washington is certainly a different one from mine at home. Volunteers work one week shifts just like the crew does. Our shift began last Wednesday (the day of the big blizzard) but I didn't arrive on the summit until Sunday when my February school vacation began. My husband and his brother came up for the first half of the week. They were very busy first cleaning and then cooking for the crew and and Edu. Trip and helping when the

Calm snowfall, then blowing snowstorm! 2007-02-19 10:38:24.000 - Jim Salge,  Observer Serious blowing snow... The conditions that were experienced at the summit of Mount Washington yesterday were fairly rare. Light winds and a moderate fall of large snowflakes had the staff in their glory yesterday during the outside work…and play. By the end of the ‘storm’ nearly 4 inches of 4% density snow was gently resting upon the peak. Pure powder bliss was the general emotion of the staff!Conditions this morning are a stark contrast from yesterday. In addition to the brutal temperatures and windchills, all of the snow that

Back to normal... 2007-02-18 11:00:05.000 - Brent Antkowiak,  Summit Intern The failure point... The big story on the summit this morning is that the primary pitot tube anemometer is back online after yesterday’s short outage! After some intense, un-routine maintenance Friday evening and yesterday morning, the crew cleared the pitot around 9:45 a.m., and we have since been logging wind data as normal. The problem occurred in the skirt of the pitot tube’s vane, which had somehow become iced up despite extreme heating in the instrument. Luckily, this occurred at the end of our most recent cold outbreak, with temperatures

A note from the downgoing crew... 2007-02-17 07:31:13.000 - Jim Salge,  Observer Be back shortly... Now slightly dated due to the storm the other day, I wish to post the comment left by Jon Cotton on the down going shift written Wednesday morning. A few quick notes though. Our primary, heated pitot wind speed recorder has developed an ice jam that has been difficult to dislodge. Ice is common up here, jams are not! And while regular observations continue, our backup systems do not feed directly to the website database. Once every three hours though, an unheated backup pitot is

Blizzard in the bunk rooms... 2007-02-16 10:02:24.000 - Jim Salge,  Observer How Note: the pitot anemometer is undergoing un-routine maintenance, and the backup systems do not flow directly to the webpage. Indicated windspeeds are likely inaccurate!*************************You did it! Thanks to your support of the Observatory, we’ve completed our membership drive and have flipped on the new Presidential Webcam. And since it’s been flipped on, it’s been nothing but grey. Eh, well, that’s Mount Washington. You take the spectacular with the often endless streaks of ‘in the clouds.’ I look forward to the first clear sunset from this webcam!The continued cold