CHESTERTOWN, MD
The Kent County Office of Emergency Services (OES) is proud to announce its partnership with the University of Maryland, the Maryland Department of Emergency Management, the Maryland Environmental Service, and the Maryland Department of Health in utilizing the newly activated Maryland Mesonet weather monitoring station. This station is located on the grounds of the Behavioral Health Whitsitt Center in Chestertown, Kent County, MD, and provides real-time, live weather data. To view the station’s live data, visit: https://mesonet.umd.edu.
The Chestertown station is one of over 70 planned stations across the State of Maryland. Kent County OES will use information and data from the station to forecast weather events allowing probable advance notification of adverse weather conditions. The stations will be spaced 10 miles apart and are equipped to sample and transmit collected data within one minute. Variables to be measured include wind speed and direction, solar radiation, air temperature, relative humidity, atmospheric pressure, rainfall, snow depth, and soil moisture and temperature in the upper 1 m soil layer.
These stations will support local decision-making, quantify impacts on critical infrastructure from natural hazards, enhance public safety planning and identify long-term community risk and the data can be leveraged when requesting Presidential Disaster Declarations and Hazard Mitigation funding.
Other data-driven applications include Agriculture, Education, Utilities, Green Energy, Environment, Forest/Wildfire Management, Transportation and Tourism.