Metadata for NOAA/GLERL Alpena, MI Met Station

Data for the Alpena Thunder Bay National Marine 
Sanctuary & Underwater Preserve Meteorological Station:

LATITUDE:  45-03-35 N
LONGITUDE: 83-25-25 W
Site online: 04 Oct 2001, relocated to current location 27 Oct 2005

LOCATION:  On the Alpena Harbor Light

Site Elevation: 177.5 m above mean sea level
   Lake level above sea level:  176.0 m
   Base of tower above lake level: 1.5 m
Anemometer Height: 19 m above site elevation (raised from 17m on 7/5/06)
Air Temp Height: 15 m above site elevation


NOTE: On 10/27/2005, the Alpena Met Station was moved to its new location on the Alpena Harbor Light.
The sensors were serviced at that time.
OLD LOCATION (for data prior to 10/27/2005):
   On the grounds of the Alpena water inlet plant located adjacent 
   to the Alpena Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary & Underwater Preserve,
   45-02-47 N, 83-26-45 W. Site Elevation: 179.1m, Anemometer: 9.1m, Air Temp: 8.2m
   

Wind Sensor:  R.M. Young model 5103 Wind Monitor mounted on a 10' mast clamped to the light
deck rail.

Temperature Sensor:  CSI model 109 thermistor mounted in a naturally aspirated Gill type 
radiation shield mounted about 3 feet below the Wind Monitor.

Processor:  CSI model CR200.  This units samples the sensors every 5 seconds and is set to
an averaging interval of 5 minutes.

Power:  The system is run from a power supply on the AC line.

Scheme:  The CR200 communicates through a LinkSys wireless bridge to a base station site
located near the Thunder Bay Marine Sanctuary.

The system is interrogated by a PC from Ann Arbor running the CSI LoggerNet software
connected to the internet.

The data set consists of three 5 minute data ensembles.  Averaging and interrogation
intervals and the system program are adjustable remotely.  The system data rate is set to
1200 baud.

Data Line: The data line is space delimited and consists of the following columns in order from 
left to right.

1:Station ID, 6 (Alpena)
2:Year
3:Day of Year
4:Time, UTC
5:Average air temperature, Deg C
6:Wind Speed average m/s
7:Wind Speed maximum, m/s
8:Wind Direction, average, degrees from (0=north, 90=east)

WebCam:
The webcam uses a Toshiba IK-WB15A series network camera and shares the met station
wireless bridge. An internet process at GLERL periodically downloads a moderately compressed
VGA resolution image.  The image resolution and location (PTZ) can be adjusted from GLERL.
The camera orientation is south.  With 180 degree PTZ functionality, it auto patrols North
Point (SE), the southern harbor inlet light structure (S) and the Alpena City Marina (SW).

John Lane
USDOC-NOAA-GLERL
Marine Instrumentation Laboratory
7-10-2006