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Avondale the site for new weather station
19 February 2008
Brenton Stacey
The station, covering an area of 256 square metres, will measure temperature, humidity, rainfall, air pressure, and wind speed and direction each hour. The bureau will build the station, subject to the approval of a lease agreement, in a paddock on the southeast side of the Lake Macquarie campus, near an existing weather station.
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Public relations officer
The building of an automatic weather station (AWS) at Avondale College will continue an almost 50-year association between the Cooranbong-based tertiary institution and the Bureau of Meteorology.
The station, covering an area of 256 square metres, will measure temperature, humidity, rainfall, air pressure, and wind speed and direction each hour. The bureau will build the station, subject to the approval of a lease agreement, in a paddock on the southeast side of the Lake Macquarie campus, near an existing weather station.The site is in an open area, which will give a more accurate measure of wind speed and direction. It is also representative of the local area.
"Lake Macquarie City Council wanted to set up an AWS in one of its wards," says Terry Bluett, the bureau's observation manager for New South Wales. "We found two sites, one at Avondale and one at Belmont, but Avondale was more suitable in part because Belmont had similarities with our Nobby's Head site."
Avondale has been the official location of rain measurement in Cooranbong for the past 15 years and from 1903 to 1934--the postmaster at the former Cooranbong Post Office measured rainfall between 1935 and 1993. Two recording sites are located on the Lake Macquarie campus. One contains a standard manual rain gauge, measured by Dr Howard Fisher, dean of the Faculty of Arts and a senior lecturer in geography, at 9 am each day. The other contains a solar-powered automatic rain gauge, which transmits a signal via radio wave to the bureau as part of the state's flood warning network.
Bluett describes Dr Fisher, one of 6000 rainfall volunteers in Australia, as a "good friend" of the bureau. "He's a little cog in a big wheel."
Caption: Geography lecturer Brad Watson checks out Avondale College's existing weather station. The Bureau of Meteorology plans to build a larger automatic station on the college's Lake Macquarie campus.
Credit: Ann Stafford
Credit: Ann Stafford
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