My short time here on the summit!

2020-01-07 11:23:27.000 – Nicholas Rousseau, PSU Summit Intern

Hi, my name is Nicholas Rousseau, and I am a research intern from Plymouth State University. It has been thrilling to spend the past 10 days at the Mount Washington Observatory. During my time on the summit, I worked with the observers learning about the operations here at the observatory and working on a research project for Dr. Eric Kelsey. The research project I have been working on involves understanding why the summit of Mount Washington is warming slower than lower elevations of the Northeast. For my project, I wrote a Python script to Identify transitions of the planetary boundary layer during Mount Washington Observatory‘s nearly 88-year climatology. I’m extremely grateful for this opportunity to do research somewhere so beautiful and with such extreme weather. I got to experience the strong winds that Mount Washington is so famous for and also enjoyed the amazing views of the mountains when visibility Is high. The picture below I took on the morning of December 19^th when doing the building walk around.

 

All the observers have been amazing mentors during my time here on the summit. They have taught me all about the hourly observations, forecasting, AMS radio call, de-icing the instruments, and much more! This internship has taught me many skills that will advance me in school and a future career. I will never forget this amazing experience and I will miss staying up here on the summit. In the spring, I’ll be going back to Plymouth State University to finish my junior year of college and continue my research with Dr. Kelsey.

Nicholas Rousseau, PSU Summit Intern