By Barbara Bradley
You don’t have to look out the door or the window or even turn on the television to get the weather forecast. It’s as close as your computer or smart phone.
Sign in to the John Knox Village portal, choose “Important Links”, then scroll to John Knox Village Weather Station. That link will take you via Weather Underground to our own John Knox Village Station.
The first thing you see is a circle showing the current temperature. It even tells you what the temperature actually feels like, with the wind chill! The high and low for the day are also noted. To the right is the icon for the conditions and below that is wind speed. Above, is a small map showing a radar view of our area. Plus and minus signs let you zoom in or out, and clicking on the triangle animates the map to show the movement of upcoming rain.
The next section shows the forecast for the rest of today, tonight and tomorrow. Clicking on the precipitation forecast brings up a graph of rainfall by half–hour increments for the next six hours.
Scroll down and you see a square with current precipitation. Click on any item in that box and again you will see the precipitation forecast for the next six hours! Use your browser’s back button to go to the previous screen to see boxes showing the pollen count, the air quality and index, and the UV index which are to the right of precipitation.
If you are interested in the air pressure, visibility or other like items, scroll down to the next section. Astronomy items are highlighted below that with the temperature almanacs for the current and previous day to the right.
One more scroll will let you explore other nearby weather stations, such as DeLand, Lake Helen, and DeBary.
The station is atop the roof of the guardhouse at the new gate at the end of Holly Branch Lane. It’s so small you might not even notice it. Check it out on the next windy day; the little cups will be whirling!