Comments on: NOAA MI3 Station Location Maps

By: John Blake

John Blake — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 17:08:07 +0000

Surely, in a scientific data-collection project of this magnitude (not to say importance), a decades-long pattern of non-uniform apparatus, poorly sited, subject to innumerable reporting discrepancies which authorities refuse to admit or reconcile, cannot be taken seriously on any level.

snip

By: steven mosher

steven mosher — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 16:38:36 +0000

rec31.

All you need is a surfacestation triptik.

You enter your starting point and destination and a route and directins are
calculated that allow you to visit every station within a user selected distance.

By: Julie KS

Julie KS — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 13:58:58 +0000

BarryW, the KML file is wonderful. It’s been very useful for helping to see at a glance which stations are near our travel routes, and how far away they are. Thanks very much for doing it.

By: BarryW

BarryW — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 13:22:52 +0000

Re #29

Thank you. No, I didn’t take your previous entry in a negative sense. I’m happy to see that someone has found the kml file useful. I just wanted to post an FYI so that people where aware that the locations NOAA has on the MMS are consistent with their other documentation (but not necessarily correct), but even with the GPS locations Goolgle Earth may not show the site at the correct spot in the image.

By: Don.W

Don.W — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 05:42:53 +0000

#28 Barry, please dont misunderstand my concern. My concern isnt with the .kml file. I was happy to use it and it was a wonderful guide pointing out the stations that we would be able to visit along our route.

My concern was that we found a weather station within what you would expect of the coordinates given. The only problem, was that the weather station we found had nothing to do with the USHCN network and the actual station was at least a half mile away as the crow flies. We were more concerned that maybe the official site was retired and nobody bothered to tell the curator of the site that data was now being acquired from another site with non-compliant equipment. I think its just another example of just how much detailed information NOAA has on its network sites.

Our experience with your .kml was nothing but positive for all the other sites we visited. At most I think we found the sites within an easy city block of what was listed in the file. We found sites that we couldnt audit because curators werent home, or they were behind locked gates and so on, but we found all the sites we set out to find! The file is definitely a helpful and worthwhile effort on you part. Good job and thank you!

By: BarryW

BarryW — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 00:22:06 +0000

The MMS data agrees with the Master Station List on their website. I built the kml file for Anthony that’s on the surfacestations website. As a check I plotted the locations for Petaluma of the MMS value, GPS from the survey form and the site location from the survey that is marked on the image and they all disagree. I haven’t tried Virtual Earth to see if the registration is any better. The problem could be map registration or error in the GPS reciever, probably some of both.

By: Chris D

Chris D — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 19:51:32 +0000

Like others, I’ve found the listed locations and maps in the Map tab to not always correspond. I’ve tried to document inconsistencies in the survey reports. Furthermore, the locations found in the NCDC Radar Data Inventories ( http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/stationlocator.html ) don’t malways match all that well against the MMS, either. I suspect all these issues documented in this thread are symptomatic of the larger QC problem that surfacestations.org has been documenting at the site level. I also have to wonder what coordinates are used for determining lights vs no lights.

By: JerryB

JerryB — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 18:27:36 +0000

Re #17 and #18,

The Stevenson screen was designed not to use a fan.

By: Armand MacMurray

Armand MacMurray — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 18:20:31 +0000

Since this thread is attracting some surfacestations folks, I thought I’d post a few techniques I’ve found useful:
1) Since Google Earth’s photo coverage is often lower-resolution outside cities, try an alternate like maps.live.com (Microsoft’s Virtual Earth). I’ve found it to have good high-resolution photo coverage even in rural areas (at least for WA state). Use the “3D” mode for maximum zoom — the “2D” mode, though seemingly using the same photos, won’t let you zoom in quite so far.
2) http://www.topozone.com allows you to access USGS topographical maps for free. Although you can pay for an enhanced service, I’ve found the free service sufficient so far. They also sell access to USGS aerial photos; for our purposes, you can often get the info you need just by looking at the free preview/sample photo for an area.
3) As mentioned by Murray, the local PO is often used as a reference point. Both Google Earth and Microsoft Virtual Earth will plot the locations of post offices for you – just do a search for “post office” as the business type.

By: Julie KS

Julie KS — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 17:56:06 +0000

I’ve had similar experiences with the 5 I’ve surveyed. Accuracy of the MMS coords varied from “spot on” to “pretty good” for the current locations, but even a 100′ can make a lot of difference for microsite issues. One station’s given coords were correct for the precip instruments, but I found that the MMTS was far away from them and right up against the house. I think this shows the value of the ground truthing being done with both photos and GPS.

I do NOT trust the coords for the previous locations, especially the ones from pre-GPS days. Some of don’t seem to make much sense as a location when you view them in satellite view. I think JS at #13 is right about those, and it’s difficult to know how accurate they are, except maybe for the few that include a street address in the location metadata.

I’ve had good luck with Google Earth using my own handheld’s coordinates. When I enter the numbers from my GPS into GE, the landmarks around the station show up right where they should.