Aachen weather station
The Aachen weather station (WMO code: 10505) is one of twelve climate reference stations of the German Weather Service (DWD) and has been based in Aachen - Orsbach , Schiefdell 11 since 2011. Its beginnings are in the 19th century and the meteorological observatory emerged from it in 1895 Aachen, which was set up five years later on the Wingertsberg in the Aachen city garden and moved to Hamburg in 1977. After the relocation of the observatory, operations in Aachen were resumed as a normal weather station and radioactivity measuring station and upgraded to a climate reference station in 2011.
prehistory
Since 1820 there have been temperature records in Aachen, which at that time were still incomplete, and since 1830 a first meteorological measuring station. After the establishment of the Royal Prussian Meteorological Institute in Berlin in 1847, Aachen became a second-order weather station in the official observation network and carried out continuous weather observations until 1852. After that there were no more documented weather records from Aachen for 20 years and the weather station was not officially resumed until 1872.
Finally, in 1894, the trained meteorologist and seismologist Peter Polis took over the position of director of the meteorological station in Aachen, which received the status of a meteorological observatory a year later. In this function he was among other things editor of the German Meteorological Yearbooks for the Aachen area from 1895 to 1915 . His father, the factory owner Jean Matthias Polis, was impressed by his son's plans and activities and financed the construction of a central weather observation building on the Wingertsberg in the Aachen city garden. Three other local measuring points in Alfonsstrasse, at the gas works and in the Aachen forest on the Pelzerturm were subordinate to the observatory and reported their observations to it.
Meteorological Observatory Aachen
Due to its exposed location directly on the outskirts and around 30 meters above the level of the city, the 193 meter high Wingertsberg was predestined for the construction of the Aachen weather station. This was inaugurated on September 22, 1900 in the presence of the meteorologist Adolf Sprung from Berlin, the geophysicist Georg von Neumayer from the Deutsche Seewarte in Hamburg , the geologist Albrecht Penck from Vienna and the rector of the Technical University of Aachen Hans von Mangoldt , and Peter Polis was the first Director appointed. At the same time, the outstations at the gas works and in Alfonsstrasse were given up and only the station in the city forest, where an English hut was stationed, was retained . Through his intensive research into the weather conditions for sea and aviation, Polis gained a renowned reputation beyond the national borders with his Aachen observatory, which has meanwhile been run as an institute of the technical university. Even the last German Emperor Wilhelm II, who lived in exile in Haus Doorn in the Netherlands , sent his daily weather observations to the Aachen weather station until 1935.
Shortly before his death in 1929, Polis received approval for an extension on the Wingertsberg and for necessary modernization measures. The successor to Polis was the meteorologist Otto Hoelper (1893-1944), who headed the observatory until 1935, which was then placed under this weather service until 1945 according to the ordinance of the Reich Weather Service of April 6, 1934. During the Battle of Aachen in October 1944, the building suffered severe damage and could only be rebuilt in 1949/1950 with the help of the city of Aachen. After the re-inauguration on October 2, 1950, operations were initially resumed as a weather station.
As part of the reorganization of the German Weather Service, the Aachen station received the status of an observatory again from 1953. The meteorologist and geophysicist Hans Israel (1902–1970), who was appointed to RWTH Aachen University, also took over its management until his death in 1970 and set up the “Air Electrical Research Center Buchau a. F. “with the observatory. In the now named “Meteorological Observatory Aachen - Specializing in Air Electricity ”, measurements of radioactive additions in the atmosphere and in precipitation have taken place since 1959. From 1967 onwards, new measuring methods with the help of LiDAR systems were introduced at the observatory for research purposes , about which the scientists Borchardt and Rössler wrote a detailed experience report.
As a result of further restructuring in the DWD, the observatory was moved to Hamburg on February 1, 1977, and a meteorological station and radioactivity measuring station was set up again in Aachen at the previous location on Wingertsberg.
Building description
The first building destroyed in the Second World War was divided into a two-story main building that merged into an equally massive two-story square tower on which a small octagonal turret was placed. On the latter were the wrought-iron scaffolding for the anemometer and the shell ring, which protruded 28 meters above the ground. The main building and the square tower ended with a flat roof , which was used for observation purposes and created space for further measuring devices. The walls were in Haustein - and brick construction pulled up and inside insulated against heat radiation. Additional massive pillars and stone consoles in the interior should protect the sensitive devices from vibrations. The lecture hall and the instrument room were located on the ground floor, in which the compensation pendulum and the recording devices for the anemograph , the barograph and the thermograph were installed.
While the upper floor of the main building and the first floor of the tower were reserved for the work rooms and the laboratory, the caretaker's apartment was on the second floor of the tower. The attached octagonal turret with its windows built in on all sides served exclusively as a protected observation room. From there a spiral staircase led to the top platform with the sunshine autograph and the anemograph enclosed by a balcony that could be climbed.
In front of the building an instrument field was set up on which the rain gauge , the soil thermometer and two English huts were set up, which among other things offered space for the hygrograph , the thermograph and the atmometer .
The existing post-war building is just a spacious two-storey, almost square and whitewashed new building, to which a small, single-storey extension is attached to the side. The main building has a platform roof that was used for observations and the installation of the measuring devices until 2011. The current use of the building after the weather station moved out is still unclear.
Aachen weather station
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From 1977 to 2011, the Aachen weather station continued to operate on the Wingertsberg. In the meantime, the conditions for weather recordings there no longer met contemporary standards, mainly due to the high tree cover, and therefore a move to the fields near Orsbach was arranged. Since the international measurement criteria could be met at this new location, the weather station was also certified as one of a total of twelve full-time climate reference stations of the DWD, which are the contact for many weather services in the European Regional Association of the World Meteorological Organization. Finally, on May 12, 2011, the new climate reference station near Orsbach was inaugurated. Furthermore, radioactivity monitoring was retained, which is of particular importance with regard to the current problems with the neighboring Belgian nuclear power plants Tihange and Doel .
The future in Orsbach looks uncertain for the five full-time employees working in 2015, as according to the DWD press release, all weather stations will be fully automated by 2021. The employees should be placed in new tasks in the DWD taking into account social compatibility.
literature
- August Heinrich Sieberg : The newly built meteorological observatory in Aachen , in: Naturwissenschaftliche Rundschau , Braunschweig 1900, pp. 527-528
- Peter Polis: The newly built meteorological observatory in Aachen , G. Braun, Karlsruhe 1901
- Hermann Henze: The daily course of the air temperature in Germany , Volume 254 of publications of the Royal Prussian Meteorological Institute, Springer-Verlag 2013, page 13 digitalisat
Web links
- Facts and figures about the Aachen weather station
- Data from the Meteorological Observatory in Aachen in the North Rhine-Westphalia State Archive, Rhineland Department
- Imperial weather at Haus Doorn - Wilhelm II reports his weather to Aachen , Archives of the Month July 2016 on the website of the City Archives of Aachen
Individual evidence
- ↑ Kaiserwetter bei Haus Doorn - Wilhelm II reports his weather to Aachen , The archival document of the month July 2016, published by the Aachen city archive
- ^ Hans Israel: Das Meteorologische Observatorium des Deutschen Wetterdienstes , in: Physikalische Blätter , Vol 11, Is 2, February 1955, pp. 77-80
- ^ Heinrich Borchardt and Johannes Rössler: Experiences and considerations with LIDAR at the meteorological observatory in Aachen , in: Reports of the German Weather Service , No. 125, self-published by the German Weather Service, Frankfurt am Main 1971
- ↑ Ulrich Otte: Inauguration of the Aachen weather station as a climate reference station for the German Weather Service (DWD) on May 12, 2011 Speech on the occasion of the inauguration
- ^ Tasks and presentation of the weather stations of the German Weather Service, section: Future presentation of the DWD
Coordinates: 50 ° 47 '55.4 " N , 6 ° 1' 27" E