Doing science in Hawaii

Photo Caption: Sunset 11,200-feet over the Pacific at Hawaii's Mauna Loa Observatory. Photograph by Forrest M. Mims III.
The atmospheric research I do in Texas is critically dependent on calibrations of my instruments each year on the world's largest single mountain.
The mountain is Hawaii's Mauna Loa, and for each of the past 20 years my instruments and I have made one or more trips to the Mauna Loa Observatory, the world-famous atmospheric research station perched high on the mountain.
Hawaii is one of the world's most popular tourist destinations, and long ago I learned to avoid telling friends about my annual trips there. In their minds, Hawaii meant vacation time. They had no idea what it's like to live 10 or more days and nights 11,200 feet over the beaches and coconut palms that symbolize the Aloha State.
Back in the 1950s and 60s, the MLO staff worked three- to five-day shifts on the mountain. When the road was improved, the long overnight stays became unnecessary. So I'm usually alone on the mountain after the day crew is gone. Every two days I drive down to a beach to inhale some oxygen, take a shower and buy groceries.
Each day begins at 5 a.m., when I check the eastern sky for clouds and haze, either of which can hamper the sunlight measurements that will be made over the next several hours. In April and May, dust and smog from China sometimes form dark bands over the horizon. Occasionally volcanic haze from the erupting Kilauea volcano forms similar bands.
When the sky is clear at MLO, it's really clear. That's why it's considered one of the world's best places to calibrate atmospheric instruments that measure particles in the sky as well as the sun's ultraviolet, the ozone layer and the water vapor layer, all of which I've been measuring from a field near Seguin since 1988.
I'm just back from this year's stay at MLO, which was accompanied by much more cloudiness than usual. One day, two giant thunderstorms dropped three separate showers of hail. The next morning my rental car was coated in ice. Fortunately, four of the 13 days were perfect calibration days.
Some folks suffer from altitude sickness at MLO. My only problem is dry nasal passages. This can affect sleep, and the best solution is a few spurts of saline solution.
While I acclimate to the reduced oxygen at MLO very quickly, returning home is another matter. Recovering from this year's 13 days and 12 nights at MLO took nearly a week. Old timers I interviewed for a forthcoming book about the history of MLO told me very similar stories about their time on the big mountain.
Mims' book about the history of the Mauna Loa Observatory will be published by the University of Hawaii Press. His science is featured online at www.forrestmims.org