Finished! Looks like this project is out of data at the moment!
Southern Weather Discovery Phase II - The Week it Snowed Everywhere!
Data keying for this phase is completed - thanks to all our wonderful volunteers for their help!!!
This phase of Southern Weather Discovery has some extra support from a Microsoft AI for Earth grant. |
"The Week it Snowed Everywhere" dataset will help us improve understanding of extreme weather events within the context of long-term climate change. |
FAQ
Why are we rescuing ship logbook data?
We need to understand more about past climate so that we can predict future climate with greater certainty. There is a lack of historic climate data in the Southern Hemisphere, in part because there isn't much land! But fortunately, there is a huge resource of ship logbooks which contain climate information. These data are of significant value to climate researchers as they allow us to fill in the gaps in the historical climate data record and enable us to run our climate models better. We just need to get the numbers off paper and digitised!
In a nutshell, what are we asking volunteers to do?
We have a huge amount of old ship logbook data on paper that has been photographed by collaborators in the UK. Now we need to get this data out of the photographs and into global databases. Humans physically keying the data is the best way to do this as computer algorithms aren't quite there yet!
What will the data be used for?
The logbook data that volunteers key for this project will be used to improve global climate models that look at past climate. In particular, the data will be fed into the 20th Century Reanalysis, a climate model that makes reconstructions of past daily weather conditions. The data will also be used to understand more about specific weather events (e.g. big storms or heavy snowfall) and the climatic conditions that led to them.
Will the data be made freely available?
Yes - the barometric pressure data will be available through the International Surface Pressure Databank and all of the data will be available through other climate databases. Where to access the data will be updated in due course.
Who is funding this project?
The project is funded by the New Zealand Government's Deep South National Science Challenge and the European Union Copernicus Climate Change Data Rescue Service. Researchers from the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) in New Zealand and leading the project, supported by colleagues in the UK, USA, Australia, and Europe.