Post Trip Report: Week 3
February 13, 2019
Merrimack High School
Sean Muller
We arrived at the base of Mt. Washington at 8:00 am in the morning. The skies were clear, it did not seem to be very windy, and the temperature was about 5 degrees.
As we loaded our equipment into the Snow Cat, we were introduced to the members of the Mount Washington Observatory staff that were headed to the summit.
The journey was slow and relaxing. A third of the way up the mountain, the team stopped at a weather substation to replace a broken wind speed meter. When getting out of the Snow Cat, we noticed that there was a halo around the sun.
It was interesting to walk around the substation and to watch the scientists work as a team to make the repairs. Once the broken part was replaced, we continued up the mountain. As we continued our journey to the summit, we made another stop at a second substation to locate a solar panel that was torn off the station by the high winds the previous week. The solar panel itself was found intact about 25 feet from the substation, but its metal frame was in pieces.
Upon our arrival at the summit, we attended the weekly weather briefing for the region and were given a tour of the facility. It was interesting to see the different computer weather models and how they were used to discuss the upcoming weather for the week and learned why Mt. Washington experiences such severe winds.
Next, we bundled up and took our equipment into the weather observation tower and into a space called the cold room. This is the room scientists use to carry out cold temperature experiments sheltered from the wind. The room was very cold, but not cold enough to freeze our soap bubble film. However, we were able to use our equipment to photograph the ice crystals that were forming on the windows of the cold room.
After taking a few pictures, we went outside to see if we could capture and photograph some blowing snow on our catch boards. Unfortunately, the blowing snow particles we were able to catch were just tiny pellets of snow. While outside, we also photographed the summit. Photographing subjects in the extreme cold was an interesting experience. It was difficult to press the shutter button and the wind took all our heat away almost instantly, draining the camera batteries within minutes.
Before returning back inside, we walked to the snow trap, to see how the scientists capture snow to measure snowfall totals. Due to the impending storm, we needed to cut our time outside on the summit short, and by that time we were ready to return to the warmth of the observatory.
Once we were inside, the observatory staff set up a video conference with our students. They were able to ask questions and we were able to share what we learned with them. By the time we had loaded up our equipment, boarded the Snow Cat, and returned to the base of the mountain, it had started lightly snowing. We stopped for lunch in Plymouth, and after lunch it was snowing so hard we decided to see if we could photograph some snowflakes using our catch boards outside the car windows in the parking lot using a cell phone with a macro attachment and a DLSR with a macro lens. We were very successful. We were able to observe that the flakes were formed at different temperatures and that the temperature was changing as we were taking photographs based on the shape of the crystals. The first flakes were hexagonal columns, which were followed by hexagonal plates, and finally dendritic flakes.
A couple of days after the trip, we finally had snow during the school day. Our students were able to use their cameras and catch boards to photograph snowflakes. Once they finished, they examined their images and classified the different structures found in their snowflakes using the chart Snowflakes- Classifications and shapes found at www.compoundchem.com . They were also able to use the shape to determine information about the temperature as well.
This trip was a fabulous experience for us as educators and for our students. We learned how weather data is collected, how to photograph subjects under extreme weather conditions, and how scientists use snowflake data. Our students were able to learn how to take photographs of snowflakes, classify the features found on their snowflakes, and make inferences about the weather conditions under which the snowflakes were formed.
Merrimack High School
Sean Muller
We arrived at the base of Mt. Washington at 8:00 am in the morning. The skies were clear, it did not seem to be very windy, and the temperature was about 5 degrees.As we loaded our equipment into the Snow Cat, we were introduced to the members of the Mount Washington Observatory staff that were headed to the summit.
The journey was slow and relaxing. A third of the way up the mountain, the team stopped at a weather substation to replace a broken wind speed meter. When getting out of the Snow Cat, we noticed that there was a halo around the sun.It was interesting to walk around the substation and to watch the scientists work as a team to make the repairs. Once the broken part was replaced, we continued up the mountain. As we continued our journey to the summit, we made another stop at a second substation to locate a solar panel that was torn off the station by the high winds the previous week. The solar panel itself was found intact about 25 feet from the substation, but its metal frame was in pieces.
Upon our arrival at the summit, we attended the weekly weather briefing for the region and were given a tour of the facility. It was interesting to see the different computer weather models and how they were used to discuss the upcoming weather for the week and learned why Mt. Washington experiences such severe winds.
Next, we bundled up and took our equipment into the weather observation tower and into a space called the cold room. This is the room scientists use to carry out cold temperature experiments sheltered from the wind. The room was very cold, but not cold enough to freeze our soap bubble film. However, we were able to use our equipment to photograph the ice crystals that were forming on the windows of the cold room.
After taking a few pictures, we went outside to see if we could capture and photograph some blowing snow on our catch boards. Unfortunately, the blowing snow particles we were able to catch were just tiny pellets of snow. While outside, we also photographed the summit. Photographing subjects in the extreme cold was an interesting experience. It was difficult to press the shutter button and the wind took all our heat away almost instantly, draining the camera batteries within minutes.
Before returning back inside, we walked to the snow trap, to see how the scientists capture snow to measure snowfall totals. Due to the impending storm, we needed to cut our time outside on the summit short, and by that time we were ready to return to the warmth of the observatory.
Once we were inside, the observatory staff set up a video conference with our students. They were able to ask questions and we were able to share what we learned with them. By the time we had loaded up our equipment, boarded the Snow Cat, and returned to the base of the mountain, it had started lightly snowing. We stopped for lunch in Plymouth, and after lunch it was snowing so hard we decided to see if we could photograph some snowflakes using our catch boards outside the car windows in the parking lot using a cell phone with a macro attachment and a DLSR with a macro lens. We were very successful. We were able to observe that the flakes were formed at different temperatures and that the temperature was changing as we were taking photographs based on the shape of the crystals. The first flakes were hexagonal columns, which were followed by hexagonal plates, and finally dendritic flakes.
A couple of days after the trip, we finally had snow during the school day. Our students were able to use their cameras and catch boards to photograph snowflakes. Once they finished, they examined their images and classified the different structures found in their snowflakes using the chart Snowflakes- Classifications and shapes found at www.compoundchem.com . They were also able to use the shape to determine information about the temperature as well.
This trip was a fabulous experience for us as educators and for our students. We learned how weather data is collected, how to photograph subjects under extreme weather conditions, and how scientists use snowflake data. Our students were able to learn how to take photographs of snowflakes, classify the features found on their snowflakes, and make inferences about the weather conditions under which the snowflakes were formed.
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