"Ken Cook" wrote in message
ups.com...
On 24 Oct, 11:22, Ian wrote:
Hi Ken,

Been meaning to ask, are the MetO showing much interest in your fabled
frost hollow?
Currently here. 10.2/5.2 Sc doing it's best to break...but failing.

Ian,

Hi, Ian,

I got the inspector to look at the site and instruments down there
last year and I include the reports to the Met O occasionally but they
are not particularly interested. They even disregarded the site at
Redhill Airfield because it was too extreme so what chance Copley! I
found it fascinating at Redhill, Chipstead Valley, Rickmansworth etc.
People live in these areas, so why not report their weather?

What is the true climate of Copley? This month, all within 300 metres
distance, we have Lead Mill Mean Max 13.3C M Min 3.7C Mean 8.5C Air
frost 6
Met O site Mean max 13.9C M Min 5.3C Mean 9.6C Air frost 1

Met O doesn't seem so personal these days. Years ago I received awards
for long service but that recognition seems to have gone. I ran a
station at nearby Low Etherley for 25 years and now Copley for 12
years, so the computer probably has me down as two different people!
We need the enthusiasm of the likes of Gordon Manley with his frost
site at Houghall Agricultural Colege, Durham and his hut on Great Dun
Fell. I think the few weather enthusiasts left at Met O are on this
ng, and their enthusiasm is infectious.

The Environment Agency is more interested in my obs together with Lord
Barnard the landowner. Of course, the person most interseted is me or
I wouldn't make the effort. Weather's fascinating, long live Eric
Olthwaite (Ripping Yarns)


I think to be a *real* Met man it has to be in the blood. You have to get
excited by ana fronts, blizzards, baroclinic zones, high potential vorticity,
jet streams, tornadoes, 0.1 mm of drizzle, fog etc etc. I started when I was 14
and I could code up a tephigram and work out cloud bases when I was 15, never
wanted to do anything else. You have to get up in the middle of the night at the
slightest hint of lightning or thunder, you have to gaze hours on end at a lamp
post or the velux window waiting for that first raindrop to turn to snow, you
have to look at the GFS T+384 on *every* run even though you know its going to
be wrong, you get out of bed and your first thought is what the min. was last
night or where the front has got to .... and .... you have to have a thick skin
and a sense of humour.

Will
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