Conditions on Ben Nevis are being recorded for the first time in more than a century.
A team of scientists scaled the UK’s highest mountain to install a weather station on its summit to keep track of wind, pressure, temperature, precipitation and humidity.
Such data has not been kept since 1904, when a Victorian observatory staffed by volunteer weathermen closed its door for the last time.
Dr Barbara Brooks from the expedition said: “This is a temporary weather station, which for four weeks will do the same work as the Victorian weathermen all those years ago.
“Thankfully, technology has moved on so there’s no need for our team to be stationed on the summit over the winter months.
“Having access to Ben Nevis’ records through Operation Weather Rescue means we will be able to start making comparisons, looking for any patterns and better understand the conditions on our mountain tops.
“If we can prove that the technology works and the data is robust, we’re hopeful this could lead to a new, permanent weather station on the summit that would be invaluable.”
Operation Weather Rescue: Ben Nevis launched in September to try to digitise two million “lost” measurements taken by the Victorian volunteers.
They recorded the data by hand, every hour each day of the year, from 1883 to 1904.
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