COMSTOCK PARK, Mich. — Meteorologists all over the world use a wide variety of instruments to measure things like temperature, air pressure, humidity and a host of other variables. In Tuesday's science demonstration, we show how to measure wind speed or velocity.
An anemometer is a device that measures wind speed. While we used and demonstrated a hand-held anemometer to the third graders at Pine Island Elementary School, we should note that there are much larger (similar devices) that have been placed all over the United States, the world for that matter, that measure wind speed and automatically sends the readings back to a computer. These anemometers take hundreds of samples each day that are available to Meteorologists looking at observations, or simply trying to comprise a forecast. These same devices can measure wind speed and gust speed in hurricanes and tornadoes too. This data becomes increasingly important for research purposes and to quantify the type of damage any storms create by assessing or quantifying the actual wind speed.
Our FOX 17 team of Meteorologists use a simple approach with a hand-held anemometer so we can measure wind speeds in/around severe storms, winter storms, at specific locations, or just on a normal/average day. The device itself is small with an LED readout that gives temperature and wind speed. Part of it is held up (into the wind), then a small fan or blade spins and a digital readout shows the speed of the wind.
These types of devices become increasingly important for on-air Meteorologists and storm chasers that need instant data at the exact location where they are. If anyone is interested in purchasing a wind anemometer, they can be found online and are reasonably inexpensive. By the way, the kids loved the technology. Easy enough understand, while informative enough to allow them a small peek into the world of a Meteorologist and how we retrieve some of our wind data.