September 25, 2009

Meet Dufur’s weather authority
Wayne Tienhaara wins award for 41 years of tracking Dufur’s daily weather

By Kathy Ursprung
The Chronicle

     DUFUR — Unsurprisingly, the men in Wayne Tienhaara’s backyard are talking about the weather.
     Tienhaara marvels about the 20-inch rainfall in three days in the Southeast, then asks, when will the long hot spell here come to an end?
     A trough should be here Tuesday to cool things off, says Jon Bonk. He ought to know. He’s a forecaster for the National Weather Service in Portland.
     He and the other National Weather Service officials were in Dufur Wednesday to honor Tienhaara with the John Campanius Holm Award, the second highest civilian award given by the National Weather Service.
     “Only about 25 are given out in the whole country each year,” said Jim Smith, also of the Pendleton office.
     The large plaque is given to cooperative observers who demonstrate outstanding service.
     Tienhaara has been faithfully checking and reporting weather data to the National Weather Service for 41 years — since 1968, when his father-in-law Guy Douglas gave up the responsibility.
     “We’re probably approaching 100 years,” Tienhaara said, adding his own years to those that Douglas served as cooperative observer in Dufur.
     Every day of those 41 years, Tienhaara has reported information about maximum and minimum temperatures, mean temperature, precipitation and other details.
     “It’s pretty important, considering these people volunteer and dedicate time to doing that,” said Mike Vescio, Pendleton’s meteorologist in charge. “It helps establish the climate record.”
     Tienhaara reports his findings monthly, not only to Pendleton, but to Oregon State University, Wasco County Extension Service and the City of Dufur. He is one of more than 100 cooperative observers in the Pendleton office’s forecast area, which includes central and northeastern Oregon and southeastern Washington.
     The Holm award was created to honor cooperative observers for outstanding accomplishments in the field of meteorological observations. It is named for a Lutheran minister, the first person known to have taken systematic weather observations in the American colonies. Holm made weather observations, without the aid of instruments, in 1644 and 1645 near the present site of Wilmington, Del. His son later had these observations published.
     From hundreds of nominations each year, no more than 25 of these awards are presented annually to volunteer observers. The certificate is signed by the administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and presented by local National Weather Service representatives.
     In the past, Tienhaara recorded his data from a weather station in his basement. Now he has a digital temperature gauge in his backyard.
     “It’s fine, but it makes me lazy,” Tienhaara said.
     That may be so, but Tienhaara still remains on the job day in and day out, through all kinds of weather.
     When asked about the worst he’s seen in Dufur, he talks about an ice storm 30 years ago.
     “It was two-pronged and even the oldtimers said they’d never seen such a storm before.”