Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network

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The CoCoRaHS logo

The Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network, or CoCoRaHS, is a network of volunteer weather observers in the

precipitation and report them to a central data store over the Internet. The program is an example of citizen science
.

History

In 1997, the network was started in Larimer County, Colorado, after a flash flood in Spring Creek killed five people[1] and damaged structures in the city of Fort Collins, Colorado, including hundreds of millions of US dollars in damage to the Colorado State University campus.[2]

The severity of the flood and its widespread spatial variability surprised

climatologist for the state of Colorado, asked for precipitation measurements from private citizens in the area. About 300 responded to his emergency request for data. Said Doesken later:

"The results of the data showed that more than 14 in. (36 cm) of rain fell over southwest Fort Collins, the area where the flood waters originated, while less than 2 in. (5 cm) of rain fell only 3–4 mi (5–6 km) east. The enthusiastic interest shown by volunteers and the great value of the data verified the need for such a service, and CoCoRaHS was born."[3]

The program was originally confined to Colorado (the first "Co" in "CoCoRaHS" stood for "Colorado" instead of "Community"), but began expanding to other states during the 2000s.[citation needed]

Users

A 4-inch (10 cm) plastic rain gauge, typical of those used by the CoCoRaHS program. Measurements may be taken and reported either in inches or in millimeters.

CoCoRaHS is used by a wide variety of organizations and individuals. The

hydrologists, emergency managers, city utilities (water supply, water conservation, storm water), transportation departments, insurance adjusters, the USDA, engineers, mosquito control, ranchers and farmers, outdoor and recreation interests, teachers, students, and neighbors in the community are examples of people who use CoCoRaHS data.[4]

Other programs

In or around 2000, the

Cooperative Observer program of manually recorded daily summaries.[citation needed
]

Sponsors

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) are major sponsors of CoCoRaHS and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is also a partner.[4] Other organizations have contributed either financially or with supplies and equipment. Many other organizations and individuals have also pitched in time and resources to help keep the network up and running.[citation needed]

Status

As of 2015, all fifty

District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico participate in CoCoRaHS.[5]

Canada

In December 2011, the CoCoRaHS Canada network began in Manitoba following a massive flood in that province.[6]

As of 2014, the network had expanded to the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, and Saskatchewan,[6] with over 20,000 participants as of March 2015.[4]

See also

References

  1. ^ Browning, Tom (2006-07-30). "Lessons from a killer flood". The Denver Post. Retrieved 2015-03-27.
  2. ^ "Flooding Timeline in Fort Collins". Office of Emergency Management. Archived from the original on 2007-09-27.
  3. ^ "raingaugevolunteers". www.awwa.org. [permanent dead link]
  4. ^ a b c "The Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, and Snow Network (CoCoRaHS)". Federal Crowdsourcing and Citizen Science Catalog. CitizenScience.gov. Archived from the original on 2018-07-09. Retrieved 2018-07-08.
  5. ^ "Welcome to CoCoRaHS!". CoCoRaHS. Archived from the original on 2015-03-10.
  6. ^ a b "About CoCoRaHS Canada". CoCoRaHS. Archived from the original on 2014-07-01.

Bibliography

  •  This article incorporates text available under the CC BY 3.0 license.

External links

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