New York State

Mesonet

A world-class network of environmental monitoring stations

In April 2014, the State of New York in collaboration with the Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services funded the University at Albany to design, install, and operate the NYS Early Warning Weather Detection System. The centerpiece of the system is the New York State Mesonet, a network of 126 weather stations across the state, with at least one site in every county and borough. Each of the 126 stations measures temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction, pressure, solar radiation, snow depth, and soil information. In addition, several sub-networks of specialty sites have been deployed. A Profiler Network of 17 sites provides additional atmospheric data in the vertical (up to 6 miles above ground); a Flux Network of 17 stations monitors the surface energy budget; and a Snow Network of 20 sites measures snow water content. Operated by the University at Albany, the New York State Mesonet collects, archives, and processes data in real-time every 5 minutes, feeding weather prediction models and decision-support tools for users across the greater New York region.