How is the highest weather station in Shanghai built?

Mount Everest at 8848 meters above sea level is known as the top of the world. On the top of Mount Everest, the natural environment is extremely harsh. Few people may believe that in such a high place, we can build meteorological observation stations. And this is the important part of the second Qinghai -Tibet scientific research, and it is also a pioneering work of China and the world scientific research.

On May 4 this year, a Everest scientific examination team called "Peak Mission 2022" completed the task of building the highest weather station in the world. After the completion of this station, it surpassed the automatic meteorological station built by British and American scientists in Mount Everest in 2019, becoming the world's highest altitude automatic meteorological station.

Scientific examination staff set up the highest global automatic meteorological station at 8830 meters of Mount Everest (picture source: CCTV live broadcast)

First, why must be built on Mount Everest?

"Peak Mission 2022 -Research on Comprehensive Scientific Inspection of Mount Everest High Altitude Area" A total of more than 270 scientific research team members participated in 16 scientific research groups. The most advanced comprehensive examination for testing teams and the most advanced instrument equipment.

"Peak Mission 2022" Mount Everest Scientific Examination path diagram (picture source: CCTV News)

The scientific examination set up 8 meteorological stations from 5200 meters to 8800 meters from altitude, of which 4 of more than 7,000 meters of meteorological stations were set up, and their altitude was 7028 meters, 7790 meters, 8300 meters, and 8800 meters. The reason why the meteorological station was not built at 8800 meters instead of 8848 meters was because the peaks were not fixed with snow and ice, so it was fixed on the surface of a base rock about 8800 meters.

The reason for building a high level at such a high height is to fill the gap of my country's meteorological observation. As the "third pole" of the earth, the Qinghai -Tibet Plateau is the most unique geological -geography -resource -ecological unit on the earth. The scientific community calls it "natural laboratory". At the same time, the Qinghai -Tibet Plateau is also called the "Asian Water Tower", which has bred more than ten large rivers and rivers in Asia.

Image source: veer gallery

However, my country's current observation stations are below 5,000 meters above sea level, and there is no meteorological measurement data at a higher level of altitude, but it is calculated based on remote sensing data.

In order to fill this gap, the Second Qinghai -Tibet Science and Technology Examination Team was determined to deploy 8 automatic weather stations on the north side of Mount Everest. They are distributed in steps with altitude 5200 meters, 5400 meters, 5800 meters, 6500 meters, 7028 meters, 7790 meters, 8300 meters, and 8830 meters.

2. What difficulties do you encounter during the construction process?

To build a meteorological station at Mount Everest, which is so high in altitude, it is necessary to overcome the difficulty of low -temperature and extremely hypoxia at the high wind of level 8 or more than minus tens of degrees Celsius. From 8300 meters to peaks, the mountain road rising 500 meters above sea level has taken seven or eight hours. Moreover, not only the road difficulty goes, the scientific research players also have to carry the equipment. Each set of automatic meteorological stations above 7000 meters above sea level weighs about 50 kg. The team members were carrying.

Image source: veer gallery

When I stepped on, the snow didn't pass over the knee. The players must drag out the hiking rope buried in the snow, and the icing and hardened mountaineering rope, and shake the ice to hold it out to hold it. Deqing Ouzhu, who led the team, reached Everest 4 times. He said that the arduousness of this task exceeded imagination. The scientific research team is also hailed by the media as the "Glacier Dead Team".

On May 3rd, Tianong made a beauty, and the scientific research climbing players advanced rapidly. They crossed the camps at an altitude of 7,900 meters and reached an assault camp at an altitude of 8,300 meters. In this way, at 3 am the next day, you can start to top. But I still encountered an accident. Going up from 8300 meters, the snow was fifty or sixty centimeters deep, and the safety rope along the road was buried by the snow. The safety rope is a life rope. Everyone must drag the rope out, shake off the ice, and move forward a little bit. Arrive at 8,800 meters above sea level, three hours later than the original plan.

I didn't expect the snow here deeper. After digging down for more than 1 meter, the scientific research players still did not touch the base rock that could set up the equipment. After reporting to the headquarters, they continued to climb up for more than half an hour, and found the rock body that can set up a meteorological station at a very close place to Everest.

On May 4th, Mount Everest Scientific Examinations set up the highest altitude automatic meteorological station in the world. (Picture source: Xinhua News Agency)

The new difficulty follows -the original plan to drill with an electric hammer to fix the meteorological station with expansion screws, but the mountaineering players found that the rocks of the north slope were severe, and the electric hammer drilling was easily crushed. Finally, their professional mountaineering climbing Experience, fixed the weather station with rock nails. At 12:46 on May 4th, the world's highest automatic meteorological observation was set up here.

3. How to maintain subsequent meteorological stations?

The saying that "automatic weather observation station" is not accurate, because each meteorological station must have technicians to maintain regularly. In bad weather, any activity parts will eventually be damaged. For automatic weather stations, maintenance is a big problem.

Scientists said that the current automatic weather stations at high altitude in my country are exempt from maintenance because the maintenance cost is too high. The automatic meteorological station we built in the North and South Pole can achieve unmanned maintenance for 6 to 10 years, and the longest one has reached 11 years. At Everest Construction Station, my country's scientific research institutions have developed special wind speed instruments and ultra -low temperature batteries to ensure that the instruments can run normally at low temperatures.

The design life of the Mount Everest automatic meteorological station this time is two years, and it is powered by solar panels. Its daily work is to transmit temperature, humidity, wind direction, wind direction, wind direction, wind speed, solar radiation and other meteorological information through satellite communication. These measured data obtained by the automatic meteorological station can fill the blankness of the high altitude meteorological records of Mount Everest, which is of great significance to monitoring the changes in high altitude glaciers and snow. Mount Everest is difficult to climb, but there are always people who can reach the top of the mountain; the scientific road is twisted, but some people have always persisted. Human beings live in a connected and influential earth ecosystem. Mount Everest seems far away from us, which is actually closely related. Under the snowstorm of nature, the record of the highest altitude automatic meteorological observation station in the world is not easy, and the scientific research players have also completed the "peak mission" belonging to the Chinese!

Produced: Popular Science China

Author: Ye Haiying Li Yue (Meteorological Propaganda and Popularization Center of China Meteorological Bureau)

Producer: China Science Popularization Expo

The China Science Popularization Expo is the Science Popular Science Platform of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. It is sponsored by the Computer Network Information Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Relying on the high -end scientific resources of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, it is committed to spreading cutting -edge scientific knowledge and providing fun science and education services.

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