Our aim is to share ideas about meteorology and to encourage the study of weather in schools. We are particulary keen to have articles written by students on any of the following:
The Radley College Weather Team are part of
MetLink
International which is a project which links schools to exchange
weather data and information.
We run our own weather station at school linked to a Mac computer
network in the Geography Department.
We also receive live Meteosat images and exchange information based
on the latest satellite images.
For more information please visit the
MetLink
International Weather Proejct home page.
Radley College is 4 miles
south of Oxford, England. The school is set in parkland just above
the flood plain of the River Thames.
We have about 620 boarding students (all boys, aged 13-18 years).
The Geography Department has a Mac network of 14 computers, an
automatic weather station and live Meteosat weather receiver. We have
participated in several international projects such us
MetLink
International and the KGS project shown below:
The Weather: Radley is at latitude 52 degrees north and
longitude 1 degree west.
Our climate is usually described as temperate with few
extremes. Britain lies in the westerly wind belt and has the
moderating influence of the Gulf Stream which brings warm
water and air up from the tropics. Oxford has 625mm of rain per year,
evenly distributed; average winter January temperatures are about 5
degrees centigrade (C) and average summer July temperatures are 17 C.
However there are often considerable variations.
Ode to a Depression
Locked in this frontal marriage,
The Polar maritime air
Arrives chillily home in his carriage
Leaving his spouse,1 oh but where?
She's tropical,2 humid, and warm,
Less dense, so she knows what to do
Along her front 3 the clouds form
For a nimbo-stratus boo-hoo
And then stability reigns 4
As she rather muggily moves
But what's this that rapidly gains
From behind on her low-pressured hooves?
It's that Pm airmass again
Now chasing her gustily home,
With cumulo-nimbus 5 and rain
With showers unstable that roam.
His front energetically lifts
Her warm sector aloft, and her tears
Are dried up to occasional sniffs:
An occlusion 6 we say now appears.
Stability Rules: Have no fears!
Questions :
1. What is his spouse?
2. Where has she come from?
3. Which front is this?
4. Which part of the depression is this?
5. Why not nimbo-stratus as in Verse 3?
6. What happens to the pressure gradient as the occlusion
develops?