meteks

2008-06-28 14:02:51.000 – Jeff Wehrwein,  Summit Intern

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When I first came to the Observatory, I was surprised to see only two instruments sitting atop the tower. One of them was the wind vane (which looks like an ordinary piece of metal), and the other was the pitot tube static anemometer, our year-round anemometer. I was a bit disappointed that there weren’t more exotic-looking gadgets up there, showing off the Observatory’s meteorological prowess. Lately, however, my fears of lackluster gadgetry have been relieved. On my first shift, we added a nifty Vaisala sonic anemometer to the tower, and yesterday we installed the 3-cup anemometer, which only comes out in the summer. We also installed a second sonic anemometer called a MeTEK, bringing the tower inventory to 5 instruments.n

nThe MeTEK is part of a project that involves installing four sonics on various places across the summit. These anemometers measure all 3 dimensions of the wind velocity, and the goal of this project is to be able to analyze the behavior of the wind as it crosses the summit. Steve and I installed the first MeTEK on the tower yesterday, and the second one on top of the Stage office this morning. We will install the remaining two near the precip can and at the other end of the Sherman Adams building.n

nEach anemometer has to be wired back to the server room so that we can log the data, so we spent some time setting up the wiring before we actually installed the new instruments. This was relatively simple for the first two MeTEKs, but the remaining two will require some extra work because they are far from the server room and existing wiring. We have already started investigating the wiring situation, and will hopefully be able to put the remaining two MeTEKs up by the end of this shift.

Jeff Wehrwein,  Summit Intern