Living Life in the Clouds By Maya Hartley Hi everyone! My name is Maya Hartley and I am the fourth intern for the MWOBS summer season, writing to tell you all about my experiences so far with my new life in the clouds— literally! Growing up in Newport, Rhode Island, with an offshore lobsterman for a father and a mother who worked for Naval Station Newport, weather was always the most prevalent topic in our household conversations. When I realized that it was possible for me to be one of the scientists that we watched on The Weather Channel

To the Plains: My First Storm Chase By Francis Tarasiewicz The storm that produced a very wide area of violent rotation and the one that we had to quickly outrun. Like most other meteorologists, I went through a childhood weather geek phase prior to being a certified bachelors-degree-geek. A large part of my geek street cred came from the media I consumed growing up. It’s embarrassing to admit but my screen time as a kid was filled with the Weather Channel’s Storm Stories, Discovery Channel’s Storm Chasers and any number of natural disaster documentaries. I remember the

The First Severe Heat of the Year Sweeps Across the Midwest and Northeast By Alexis George New Englanders dragged fans and air conditioners out of their closets earlier this week as the first heat wave of the year gripped the Northeast. The hot and humid weather that arrived on Tuesday, June 18th, prompted officials to declare heat alerts as temperatures skyrocketed into the 90s across many locations. And the humidity only made it feel hotter, which caused the heat index to soar over 100 degrees in parts of the Northeast on Tuesday afternoon. We saw little relief from the

Starting Out Life at 6,288 Feet By George Mousmoules Hey everyone, I’m George Mousmoules and am very excited to be one of this year’s summer interns here at the Observatory! Though I was born in southern California, I have lived in southern New Hampshire for most of my life. Growing up, I would frequently vacation with my family throughout northern New England, and am no stranger to the White Mountains and the extreme weather they are known for. It was during one of these visits that I witnessed my first hailstorm, and ever since then I have had an

USFS WMNF Trailhead Steward Program By Fawn Langerman 2024 is my third year volunteering with the USFS WMNF Trailhead Steward program, and we are off to a great start! I was drawn to this volunteering as I have sometimes encountered poorly prepared hikers on the trails and wanted to help them: I think that one of the roots of this problem is the fact that the word “hike” is such a broad term. If you are from a city (like I am, originally), the word “hike” can often mean walking on a non-paved surface. Preparedness in a city is

Highlights of My First Week on the Summit By Jacob Garside Good morning! I’m Jacob Garside, a new summer intern here at the Mount Washington Observatory. I grew up climbing Mt. Washington and the surrounding mountains and always dreamed of staying one night on the summit; now I get to spend almost fifty! I grew up in Henniker, New Hampshire, and was a rower at Concord Crew for almost five years. I’ve rowed at Youth Nationals, and have had the opportunity to row the Head of the Charles Regatta in Boston quite a few times. I am an avid

A sunset in July on Mount Washington. Guy Gosselin Remembered and Trustees Honored at 2024 Annual Meeting By Drew Bush 2023 was a year of progress at Mount Washington Observatory. We made critical investments in educational programs, research partnerships, technology, and efforts to sustain the Observatory financially. Our partners, members, and supporters are the ones who made this possible. The energy in the room at McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center was palpable when our 2024 Annual Meeting convened with friends, Trustees, and members in attendance on June 1, 2024. Earlier in the day, the Board of Trustees approved two new positions

Meet Summer Intern Joshua Elms By Joshua Elms Hi! I’m Joshua Elms, an intern working on the summit for Summer 2024. I just graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Data Science from Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, and this fall I’ll be back for my Master’s in Atmospheric Science at the same university. Indiana wasn’t where I grew up, though; I moved around the country a fair amount, living in California, Arizona, Hawaii, and Virginia before going to Indiana for college. I saw precious little extreme weather while growing up, but Arizona’s haboobs (dust storms) stuck with me.

MWOBS/MWAC Internship & Research Overview By Laura Wilson It feels like only last shift I was writing my intro blog, but here we are, over three months later, and I have no idea how to fit everything into a single blog post. This week alone I finished a full draft of my case study, hiked a section of the Presidential Traverse, lapped the snowfields, said goodbye to Tricia (the other shift’s winter intern) and saw my first ever northern lights. Every week has something new, and I feel incredibly lucky to have spent my winter working on top of

Overview of Lapse Rate Research By Karl Philippoff As a weather observer and research specialist on top of Mount Washington, in addition to my usual observer duties such as taking hourly observations, releasing forecasts, thoroughly checking our daily observations and keeping our weather instruments calibrated and in good working condition, I also look into the data that we collect both on the summit and in other weather stations we have set up around the White Mountains to investigate how the data that we collect is connected to other research projects conducted in other mountainous areas. One of the projects