December 2009 records

Although the UK media typically over-hype any weather event, December 2009 has been exceptional in several respects, as far as the Monifieth station is concerned. With 14 hours of the month remaining, it looks as though four records or firsts will be set this month:

Lowest temperature recorded (-5.9 C on 24th);
First day where the max temperature was below freezing (26th);
First month where the mean min temperature was below freezing (mean min = -0.1 C for the month);
Lowest overall mean temperature (2.5 C, which could change slightly by the end of the day).

Now of course it could be argued that these don't mean a lot since the station has been recording data for only 6.5 years, but so much of the climate "news" one sees in the MSM is based on records that, in historical terms, aren't much longer. The Arctic ice cover, for example, has been observed by satellite only since 1979, so when you see something about the Arctic reported as the most extreme "on record", keep in mind how short the record is.

Web site changes

Today marks the end of the sixth full calendar year of operation for the Monifieth weather station, and I've made a few minor modifications to the web site to mark the occasion. I've added a few bits of information to the archives page, such as some station record values for temperature, rainfall and precipitation, and improved the layout of the pages.
I've also added a link to the Watts Up With That blog run by Anthony Watts, an American meteorologist. His blog was voted the best science blog in 2009, and contains a mine of information on the climate and related matters. The blog has gained a certain notoriety amongst the warmist-alarmist camp in the global warming debate, but no matter what your views on this subject, it is well worth a visit to see how many of the warmist stories reported widely in the MSM (main-stream media) are flawed or biased.