|
Make your own weather station!Meteorologists are, among other things, recording our weather to be able to make forecasts, but why? Is it only for knowing if there may be enough wind tomorrow to go windsurfing? Not really! Meteorology is much more than that! It is the study of the atmosphere of our planet and the mechanisms or driving forces, which are responsible for our weather and climate. Observations and especially, precise predictions are, for example, essential in our daily life; for aeroplane and ship navigation, for agriculture or to establish early-warning systems for potentially dangerous events like hurricanes or floods. Thanks to long time records of weather (a snapshot of the atmosphere at a particular moment in time) scientists have been able to detect tendencies and averages on longer time scales (centuries), i.e. climate. In this way they could detect changes in the world's climate within the last decades. Precise records of data also facilitate the development of computer models that allow us to simulate future scenarios of weather and climate, and to make predictions. Here are the instruments that you can easily build for your Weather Station: Weather vane
A weather vane is an arrow, which can rotate and which adjusts its position according to the wind. This arrow is combined with a wind rose, which is oriented with a compass so that the north of the wind rose is actually really pointing towards the magnetic pole of the Earth. So when the wind blows the vane moves, the arrowhead points in a certain direction and shows you where the wind is coming from! Thus, when we hear "westerly winds" on the news, the meteorologist tells us that there will be wind coming from the west. Anemometer
* Our value of the wind velocity is of course, only an approximation, because there are more forces acting on an anemometer that will be neglected here for simplicity! Rain gauge
he unit should be in millimetres (mm) and it is sufficient to give values without decimal place (for example: 1 mm) Barometer
* Be aware that the measurements will be influenced by temperature. So keep it at a place where the temperature is relatively stable! ThermometerThe Thermometer is an instrument used for measuring the temperature. You have for sure already seen different thermometers. Glass thermometers for example, are closed glass tubes containing liquids such as alcohol or mercury. When the temperature around the tube heats the liquid, this liquid expands and moves up the tube. From a scale you can read off the actual temperature - but there are many different thermometers. To record the temperature outside, a glass thermometers or a digital thermometer can be used. Because it is difficult to construct a thermometer which is precise enough, we would ask you to take one from home, if there is none available at school. The unit of measure should be in °C (degree centigrade) and it is sufficient to give values with one decimal place (for example: 18.5). HygrometerThe hygrometer is an instrument for measuring the humidity in the air. You have for sure already experienced dry air or very high humidity for example in your bathroom, when you take a hot shower. The hygrometer measures the humidity as relative humidity. That means the content of water the air holds at a given temperature, in relation to the amount it could hold, if it was saturated. Therefore, when the hygrometer shows for example 70, it means that the air has 70% saturation for that temperature. Because it is difficult to construct a precise enough hygrometer, we would ask you, if possible, to take one from home (if there is none available at school). It will be sufficient to give the values without decimal place. |
 |
| © EUR-OCEANS Contact : info@eur-oceans.info |
Listening to the weather news we can hear for example, "there will be westerly winds". The direction of the wind is always given relative to a compass. "Westerly winds", or "north-westerly winds", but what does this tell us? Is that the direction where the wind comes from or is it the direction in which the wind blows? How can the wind direction be determined? An instrument called a weather vane makes this process easy!
When there is wind we can measure two factors. Wind direction we can measure with a weather vane, as we have already seen. The other factor is the wind velocity. This can be measured with an anemometer. The anemometer is a sort of wind wheel, which rotates at a certain velocity according to the strength of the wind. The rotations of the anemometer can be counted and the wind velocity can be given in "revolutions -or rotations- per minute (rpm)". This is the value that you are supposed to record and type into the computer.
Although some of us might not like rain too much, it is still very important. In order to record how much it rains, we need an appropriate instrument. The instrument that we will use for our weather station is called a "rain gauge". It is just as simple as a bottle that is placed outside and collects the rain. It has a scale from which we can determine the amount of water collected. Rain and snow is called "precipitation". The measure of the precipitation should be taken once a day, which allows for recording the amount of rain that has fallen within 24 hours.
Maybe you already know that atmospheric air pressure gives us information on how the weather will develop. High or low pressure means different weather situations. In simple words, high atmospheric pressure means good and low atmospheric pressure means bad weather. You can construct a simple barometer and this instrument will allow you to track changes in the atmospheric air pressure. You will be able to measure the differences in millimetres as the pointer will move up or down along a scale. Try to relate high or low pressure to the weather situation. The unit should be in millimetres (mm) and it is sufficient to give values without decimal place.