A type of instrument shelter. It is a wooden box painted white with double louvered sides and mounted on a stand four feet above the ground.

An air-launched balloon designed to be released in the eye of a tropical cyclone, float within the eye at predetermined levels, and transmit radio signals for RDF positioning.

The difference between temperature measurements taken at two significant levels above the ground. Temperatures at 10 and 40 meters are commonly used.

A set of electrical conductors, often on a backplane, that carry data and power signals among the various components of a computer.

The rising of cold water from the deeper areas of the ocean to the surface. This phenomena often occurs along the California coast during the spring and summer.

Wind with a speed between 4 and 6 knots (4 and 7 mph), Beaufort scale number 2.

See calorie.

See radiation shield.

A wind scale adapted by the U.S. Forest Service for use in the forested areas of the northern Rocky Mountains (NRM). It is an adaptation of the Beaufort wind scale. The difference between these two scales lies in the specification of the visual effects of ...

Ice crystal deposits formed by sublimation (conversion of water vapor directly to ice) when temperature and dew point are below freezing.

Radio Direction Finder.

The humidity transducinu element in a Diamond-Hinman radiosonde. Also called electrolytic strip.

Sir Napier Shaw's name for the approximate absolute temperature scale,

The water portion of the earth as distinguished from the solid part, called the lithosphere, and from the gaseous outer envelope, called the atmosphere.

Root Mean Square. This notation is used frequently with error analysis. In that context, it is the square root of the arithmetic mean of the squares of the deviations of the individual calibration points from the theoretical or ideal response.

A measurement of atmospheric conditions aloft, above the effective range of a surface weather observation. Elements evaluated include temperature, humidity, pressure, wind speed, and wind direction.

The water volume within a specified portion of a stream channel.

An atmometer which uses a filter paper disc as the evaporating element. The amount of water evaporated through the paper is read at the graduated tube reservoir.

(1) The initial component or the sensing element of a measuring system. For example, the receiver of a rain gauge is the funnel which captures the rain and the receiver of a thermoelectric thermometer is the measuring thermocouple. (2) An instrument used ...

An absolute temperature scale with the ice point of pure water defined as 273.16 K. The size of the degree is the same as on the Celsius scale, and the zero point is absolute zero.