Today, I will be explaining some of my intentions on developing a weather tower on the existing High Heaven Tower that sits 6 miles west of McMinnville at 1,742 ft in elevation. The purpose of such a tower would to help with wind and snow events. There would be temp/wind sensors placed at a 500 FT level, 1,000 ft level and top of the tower at 1,742 ft, this will allow us to find the snow level and figure out whether or not the upper air column on this side of the valley is cold enough to support snowfall. This would prevent unexpected events such as the December, 29th, 2009 Surprise Snow Storm, which could have easily been avoidable if we had monitoring stations set at certain elevations on this side of the valley. The only monitoring buffer we have for the valley is the KPTV temp towers, which is not sufficient enough for the whole Willamette valley.
Of course, this is all still in the developing phase, I still have a lot of discussions with Yamhill County (who owns the area) and looking for the National Weather Service to sponsor this and donate the needed equipment. I'm a firm believer that if we set this tower up, we are moving a step closer to better handling our winter storms and set ourselves up for more accurate forecasts in the future. This is just ONE step closer to that. More info to come...
Of course, this is all still in the developing phase, I still have a lot of discussions with Yamhill County (who owns the area) and looking for the National Weather Service to sponsor this and donate the needed equipment. I'm a firm believer that if we set this tower up, we are moving a step closer to better handling our winter storms and set ourselves up for more accurate forecasts in the future. This is just ONE step closer to that. More info to come...
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