Kentucky Mesonet Nearly Doubles in 2009

Twenty-five new weather stations have been erected in some rural parts of Kentucky over the last twelve months – almost doubling the size of the program called Kentucky Mesonet. It’s run by the Kentucky Climate Center in Bowling Green on a three-million dollar federal grant.Forecaster Ryan Sharp with the National Weather Service in Louisville says the closest station to Louisville is in Bullitt County, but it helps shape their forecasts in Louisville.“The point of the program is just to see how things vary throughout the state, because we only have the funding on the national level for these sites, like Lexington, Louisville, the sites that have the greatest impact on the most population," says Sharp, "but this way we can see the whole state of Kentucky.”Sharp says they can monitor when precipitation starts hitting the ground throughout the state, with real-time data from Kentucky Mesonet.The Kentucky Climate Center says they hope to install another twenty stations in 2010.