Vol. 2026, Issue 1
January 23, 2026
Welcome!
In an effort to build more community within the association, the AASC has started a monthly newsletter where we can share news and information about the AASC, climate organizations, and its members. Over the coming months, we encourage you to share your news and ideas for the newsletter. You’ll find information about how to do that farther down in the newsletter. We also welcome feedback on ways the AASC can communicate better with its members. Feel free to send any feedback to the AASC Communications Committee at communications@stateclimate.org. Happy reading!
President's Corner
Michigan SC and AASC President
Save the Date!
The 2026 AASC Annual Meeting will take place in Fairbanks, Alaska this year. The official meeting dates are June 24-26. The meeting will be held at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), in the lower campus area at the Wood Center. An icebreaker event will take place on Tuesday evening, June 23, at the Wood Center Pub. Registration will also open that day. Food services will be available in the Wood Center, which also features a bowling alley.
Lodging for the meeting has been secured with a room block available at the La Quinta Inn (4920 Dale Rd., Fairbanks, AK, 99709) in Fairbanks. Guests may also contact the hotel directly at 907-328-6300 and indicate they are with “AASC 2026″ to receive the group rate. A credit card will be required to hold the reservation. Rooms are available at the GSA rate of $254/night (plus tax) from June 21-28. If you plan to attend in person, you are encouraged to book your room soon so that if the room block needs to be extended, there will be availability. June is the peak of tourist season for Fairbanks, so hotel rooms will fill up quickly.
More details will be coming out soon, including a meeting website and a Call for Abstracts. In the meantime, please reach out to Martin Stuefer (mstuefer@alaska.edu) if you have any questions about the meeting.
Committee Updates
ARSCO Committee
All seven of the states that were up for ARSCO renewal this year were evaluated by the committee and recommended for renewal of their ARSCO status. The states include: Alabama, Alaska, California, Colorado, Iowa, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania. Congratulations to all of these great programs!
In 2026, the committee hopes to get back on an earlier schedule so that the renewals can be done before the AASC meeting in Fairbanks in June. The states that are up for renewal are KY, AZ, NE, SD, UT, OK, FL, LA, and SC. The committee will be meeting in February to discuss the schedule for doing the renewals and will send out more information soon.
Thanks to all the committee members, Tami Houston, Peter Goble, Mike Brown, David Robinson, and John Nielsen-Gammon, for their work in evaluating all of the renewal documents.
Submitted by Pam Knox, Chair, ARSCO committee
Mesonet Committee
In August 2025, approximately 100 people attended the Mesonet meeting in Albany, NY. The committee extends a huge thanks to the New York Mesonet for their amazing job hosting and are extremely grateful for all the hard work their staff (and everyone else) put in to make the event successful. The group continues to be active with monthly roundtable discussions on various topics of interest to the Mesonet committee – most recently discussion weather station tower footings and approaches to social media.
Some 2026 priority topics/goals of the committee consist of the recognition program, updating the website, planning the next in-person meeting and finding synergies to incorporate Mesonet data into additional products. Lastly, 2025 saw the departure of Kevin Brinson, Beth Hall and Megan Schargorodski as their committee tenure ended (thank you!). We welcomed Sean Heuser and David Dubois joining Sytske Kimball, Nathan Edwards and Chip Redmond for 2026. We will be looking for three new committee members to replace Sytske, Nathan and Chip for 2027 – if interested, please email Chip at christopherredmond@ksu.edu.
Submitted by Chip Redmond, committee chair.
Mesonet Recognition Program Committee
The AASC Mesonet Recognition Committee is now ready to accept applications!
During fall 2025, the committee completed drafting of the application form and finalized details of the review process. The application process is designed to minimize work on the part of both the applicant and reviewer; much of the application overlaps with information already requested by the National Mesonet Program. The Mesonet Recognition review process is modeled after the ARSCO Program.
As a reminder, each application will be reviewed across five general categories:
1. Station Siting (siting, instrument location, metadata)
2. Sensor Performance (primary, secondary parameters)
3.Maintenance (scheduled and emergency, documentation, metadata, site upkeep)
4.Quality Control (metadata, flag information, manual and automated QC)
5. Data Processing (archival, display, value-added products, partnerships)
Each Mesonet must pass each category/subcategory with at least a 3 out of 5 grade. This review process is meant to encourage applicants to adopt Mesonet best practices while also allowing for external feedback on how each network can improve.
For a copy of the application and further details, see the following link: https://stateclimate.org/aasc-mrp/
Submitted by Jerry Brotzge, committee chair.
Communications Committee
The AASC Communications Committee was formed to help facilitate better communication within the AASC, particularly to its members. The members of the committee are: Kevin Brinson, Chair (Delaware), Deb Bathke (Nebraska), Samantha Borisoff (NRCC), Laura Edwards (South Dakota), Russ Schumacher (Colorado), and Matt Sittel (Kansas).
Our main initiative right now is to continue improving this newsletter throughout 2026, though we will be pivoting to reviewing the AASC’s website later this year. We’ll definitely be looking to the AASC’s membership for help with that effort, so stay tuned for more information on that.
To contact the committee with your ideas and suggestions, send us an email at the email address listed at the bottom of this newsletter.
Submitted by Kevin Brinson, committee chair.
Member News
- (Alabama) The Alabama Office of the State Climatologist, in collaboration with the Cooperative Institute for Research to Operations in Hydrology (CIROH) and NOAA/NIDIS, published a retrospective analysis of the 2023 fall drought in the Southeast, examining its development, impacts, and lessons learned. The report highlights ongoing regional efforts toward drought resilience while encouraging new strategies to strengthen preparedness for future droughts.
- (Washington) Major flooding impacted Washington in December 2025. Ranking the event by the total volume of water that fell over western Washington, the total amount from Dec 8-11, 2025 ranks as the 5th highest 4-day total since 1981. There are many ways to compare heavy precipitation and floods to past events, and WASCO will continue to analyze this impactful event.
- (Colorado) The Colorado Climate Center played a key role in an innovative training program for state-level policy officials organized by the National Academies, called “Colorado Crossroads: Building Resilience from the Ground Up”
- (South Dakota) Nathan Edwards is the Fall 2025 feature story of the SDSU College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences in their quarterly magazine. They have highlighted his work in building the SD Mesonet and the partnerships with landowners, project sponsors and data users.
- (South Dakota) In fall 2025, the SD Mesonet installed a weather station at a very unique location north of Belle Fourche, SD at the geographic center of the U.S. This station photo includes the flag where the geodetic survey marker is installed. Not to be confused the geographic center of the lower 48 states in Kansas, this location includes all 50 states. The name of the station is “Center of the Nation”, and real-time weather and camera images can be seen here: https://climate.sdstate.edu/weather/?num=781.
Have a story you’d like to share about your organization? Please submit your idea to us here.
Trivia!
Who doesn’t enjoy weather and climate trivia? Certainly not the AASC! Lets see if you can solve this month’s trivia questions from the AASC Newsletter’s Trivia Master, Matt Sittel:
1. Which of these was NOT a new monthly record for December 2025?
a. Amarillo, Texas: 3 days with highs in the 80s
b. Dodge City, Kansas: 8 days with highs in the 70s
c. Salt Lake City, Utah: 9 days with highs in the 60s
d. Cheyenne, Wyoming: 18 days with highs in the 50s
2. According to NCEI, which of these western states was the most above normal in
December 2025 with an average temperature that was 11.1 degrees above its
1901-2000 mean?
a. Utah
b. Wyoming
c. Colorado
d. Idaho
See answers to this month’s trivia questions at the bottom of the newsletter!
Photo of the Month
This month’s photo of the month comes from the South Dakota Mesonet. A strong geomagnetic storm affected the upper atmosphere on November 11th, 2025, leading to many people around the country being able to see the aurora borealis. This photo shows the view of the aurora from the Mesonet’s Camp Crook weather station camera looking north. (Photo Credit: Nathan Edwards, South Dakota State University)
Contact the AASC
Have a suggestion for the newsletter? Then contact the AASC Communications Committee at communications@stateclimate.org.
For general inquiries about the AASC, contact the AASC Secretary at secretary@stateclimate.org.
Visit the AASC on the web at https://stateclimate.org!
Finally, the answer to this month’s Trivia questions: 1) D (21 in 1980), 2) A