Weather monitors in the Whites

[MindlessMariachi]

Hi -
Question: are there little weather monitors (e.g., thermometers, anemometers, and the like) tucked away on the peaks in the White Mountains? Or other places? If you google just about any place ("Mt. Moosilauke weather," "Mt. Osceola weather" whatever) There's a little google box that shows current conditions and a forecast. For example right now "Mt. Osceola weather" tells me it's 40 degrees. THere's a little "weather.com" button at the bottom though, and if I click it, it goes to the weather.com page for Lincoln NH (where it's 48 degrees). So the question is: for the Osceola conditions, is this just the weather.com site estimating, based on conditions in Lincoln? Or is there an actual battery-powered sensor up there? (I expect the computer is probably estimating somehow).
Knowing how much the weather can vary from place to place up there, and always being skeptical of the $2 keychain thermometer on my backpack, I'm always interested to know what some nearby weather station says the conditions are on a place, often after I've hiked it. Is there any good place to go for hyper-local real-world conditions? Especially on peaks?

 

[peakbagger]

There are very few weather stations located on the summits in the whites. There are sites that can estimate the conditions on the summits based on local weather stations. Its just not very practical to maintain a robust enough weather station capable of transmitting reliably on the summits except the Obs. No doubt Cannon has weather conditions at the summit given the equipment located there and Wildcat and Loon probably have stations although they may just be for their own use as they do not want to scare away customers.

There is the Obs Mesonet which is a network of weather stations https://www.mountwashington.org/experience-the-weather/mount-washington-regional-mesonet.aspx I believe some of the stations are seasonal as the high huts most likely disconnect the batteries. There have been discussions by the RMC in the past of putting a data comm link from, Gray Knob which in theory could send real time weather data but I think they elected not to do to cost and complexity. Gray Knob is oriented in the trees facing north so its not great place to generate power in winter.

The Obs weather stations along the autoroad at various elevations is good check. My house in Gorham at 1400 tracks well with the station at 1600 feet along the autoroad.

I would be very suspicious of wind readings as anemometers have a tough time dealing with icing conditions. The Obs just tested a weather station for Mt Everest so I expect it could be done but one of an Obs staff member's jobs is go out and knock rime ice off the instruments.

 

[maineguy]

What is this installation on Middle Sister?

 

[JoshandBaron]

What is this installation on Middle Sister?

View attachment 6513

Radio repeater

 

[JoshandBaron]

Weather Underground is probably the best place to look for a plethora of real time local observations. https://www.wunderground.com/wundermap

 

[maineguy]

Radio repeater

Thanks. As a ham radio operator, I really should have recognized it

 

[ChrisB]

Thanks. As a ham radio operator, I really should have recognized it

Me too. But that antenna is rather unusual. Not sure what freq it is cut for.

And looking at the way the base is mounted into the rock, I’m wondering if the installation is an earth quake sensor or some other geologic device.
KA1D

 

[maineguy]

Me too. But that antenna is rather unusual. Not sure what freq it is cut for.

And looking at the way the base is mounted into the rock, I’m wondering if the installation is an earth quake sensor or some other geologic device.
KA1D

164.150/171.525 MHz.

I heard about a project to put additional repeaters on peaks in the WMNF sometime ago, but didn't follow up. This repeater is part the system the USFS is planning to extend.

Apologies for the thread drift/hijack

 

[peakbagger]

164.150/171.525 MHz.

I heard about a project to put additional repeaters on peaks in the WMNF sometime ago, but didn't follow up. This repeater is part the system the USFS is planning to extend.

Apologies for the thread drift/hijack

The ones proposed for Cabot and Carrigan have not been installed yet. I think the budget was raided for western firefighting. No doubt with the big block of funding that got approved recently that the backlog will get shorter.