Update: There is a sequel :)
Anthony Watts of WUWT has hit the big time, being noticed by The Washington Post. But he's not the only one :)
I didn't mention what prompted Anthony's humourous efforts to find something wrong with a weather station in Greenland the other day. It was a short article by Jason Samenow of Capital Weather Gang at the Washington Post observing that a record temperature had been reported by the Danish Meteorological Institute.
Jason was subsequently plagued by tweets from Anthony Watts, demanding he issue a "retraction". Not once, not twice but three times. Anthony also sent an email. Anthony really got his knickers in a twist over that one. Here are his tweets:
@capitalweather you'll need to issue a retraction, sorry. http://t.co/Bh5rz2kVTe
— Watts Up With That (@wattsupwiththat) August 10, 2013
@capitalweather @JSamenow Are you guys going to issue retraction? Been 24 hours now. http://t.co/Bh5rz2kVTe
— Watts Up With That (@wattsupwiththat) August 11, 2013
@capitalweather @JSamenow Are you guys going to issue retraction? Its been 48 hours now. http://t.co/Bh5rz2kVTe What will it take?
— Watts Up With That (@wattsupwiththat) August 12, 2013
The Maniitsok temperature reading is valid but may or may not reach the record books
Jason Samenow has now posted a response. He did what Anthony doesn't seem to have done. He wrote to John Cappelen, data management specialist and senior climatologist at DMI. Cappelen replied that the reading was valid but because the weather station doesn't comply with all WMO standards, it might not get into the record books. He wrote: "It is generally very hard to follow the WMO standards in all details in arctic areas, but this sensor is placed so influence from the surroundings can have affected the reading in a way, so the reading maybe will have to be rejected." He will let him know once they've considered the matter and made a decision. You can read the reply at Capital Weather Gang in Washington Post.
The only reason I know all this is because I happened to look at the live stats for my blog and noticed a sudden influx of visitors. Went to see what the fuss was all about and discovered that @capitalweathergang had retweeted this:
MT @greenoctopus: If you're really going to use @wattsupwiththat as a source, consider a rebuttal: http://t.co/PGG90ibpwkJohn Samenow also referred to yours truly in a comment underneath his article. @capitalweathergang has a few more followers and Washington Post has a few more readers than both HotWhopper and WUWT. Some of them came here for a look see. Nice - and thank you to @greenoctopus :)
— Capital Weather Gang (@capitalweather) August 12, 2013
(As usual, Anthony can't wait to let his readers know that he has some clout in cyberspace.)
PS Now we wait with bated breath for Anthony tell the Japan Meteorological Agency why all the weather stations in Japan are wrong! (H/t @shawnmilrad).
PPS Without a smidgen of self-awareness, Anthony's headline for his article is "Shoot first ask questions later". Yet it was he who shot first without asking questions, and it took Capital Weather Gang to ask the question of the people who would know the answer.
