The
State Climatologist program was orphaned by the Federal Government in 1973 during budget reductions in that recession. Since that time, every state has reestablished their State Climatologist, with Pennsylvania finally filling this vacancy after more than two decades. In cooperation with the National Weather Service's Central Pennsylvania Forecast Office and the National Climate Data Center (Asheville, NC), the Pennsylvania State Climatologist will be providing detailed climatic information, primarily for Pennsylvania in a timely manner. Some national and international climatic data is also available. Since more than twenty years have passed since this office lastserved Pennsylvanians, some data is more readily available than others. It is the goal of this office to connect you with the best data source as quickly as possible (including occasional direction to sources outside of this office). This page is ever evolving, so watch for updates and new products that will be available through the Pennsylvania State Climatologist.Our Staff
Kyle Imhoff, Pennsylvania State Climatologist
Kyle Imhoff joined the Pennsylvania State Climate Office in August 2011 and became Pennsylvania State Climatologist in July 2016. Kyle is a research assistant and instructor at Penn State University. He teaches courses in weather forecasting and applied climatology, and his research interests include applied climatology, synoptic meteorology, numerical weather prediction, and weather risk. Kyle also serves as the local manager for the Penn State team in the WxChallenge national collegiate forecasting competition. Kyle is currently a member of the American Association of State Climatologists.
Prior to joining the Climate Office team, Kyle focused on weather forecasting and assisted in producing winter weather forecasts for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation in District 2. Kyle also worked as a research assistant at the University of Alaska Fairbanks in the summer of 2010 where he studied marine boundary layer cloud evolution.
Kyle was born and raised in Pennsylvania. Currently, he resides in Bellefonte, but his hometown is in Rockwood, Pennsylvania. While at Penn State, Kyle majored and earned his B.S. and M.S. degree in Meteorology.
Arthur Person, Projects Assistant
Arthur Person has developed and managed meteorological data systems and analysis software since the 1980's at Penn State. He holds bachelor's degrees in Meteorology and Speech Communications, and a Master's degree in Meteorology, all from Penn State. His role as a Unidata systems administrator at Penn State has afforded many opportunities to advance data availability and analysis capabilities for Penn State as well as other Universities through the maintenance of an Internet Data Distribution (IDD) data relay and Unidata analysis and display software. Art also maintains Penn State's Bufkit Data Distribution system originally developed by a Penn State student as part of a meteorology computer programming course and is now used by meteorologists around the world for accessing bufkit data. He also manages a Unidata THREDDS server which provides immediate access to weather information in real-time including historical archives of bufkit data. Art served on the Unidata Implementation Working Group in 1988, received an Outstanding Staff Award for Instructional Support in 1994, and has won forecasting contests as a staff participant in the National Collegiate Weather Forecasting Contest. Art joined the Climate Office staff at Penn State in 2012 and is now putting his meteorological, system management, and programming skills to use contributing to the maintenance of the Climate Office web presence, weather data collection, and weather data analysis. Art resides in State College, Pennsylvania with his wife, two children, and a much-loved Lhasa-Poo.
Paul Knight, Pennsylvania State Climatologist (retired)
Paul Knight was the Pennsylvania State Climatologist from 1994-2015. He was also a senior lecturer of synoptic meteorology at Penn State University where he taught courses in Weather Prediction, Mesoscale Forecasting, Mesoscale Topics, Forensic Meteorology and Weather Communications. Paul had been a senior forecaster for The New York Times from 1986-2009. He, along with four other colleagues, produced the weather page for the Times each day. Paul was the producer, co-host and on-camera meteorologist for WPSU and PCN’s Weather World, a fifteen minute, weeknight weather magazine show seen on Pennsylvania PBS stations since 1983 and since 2004 on PCN.
He was co-chairman of the National Collegiate Weather Forecasting Contest for six years. Paul holds the American Meteorological Society's and National Weather Association's Television Seal of Approval and is a certified consulting meteorologist and is a past president of the American Association of State Climatologists. He received the Wilson Award in 1994, the highest teaching award for the College of Earth & Mineral Sciences at Penn State, the AMS Broadcast award and Pennsylvania Broadcaster of the Year award both in 2003. He has been quoted in more than 100 newspapers and magazines, including National Geographic and has appeared on ABC, CBS and NBC national news as well as FOX News.
Paul retired from Penn State in June, 2015 and continues to reside in Boalsburg.
Fall 2015 Climate Office Helpers
Above: Rob Englund and Stefano Dipietro
From left to right: Kelly Balmes, Brian Adams, Justin McCoy, Bryant Sell, Catherine Menke, Christina Reuille, Kyle Imhoff, and Arthur Person. Missing: Lacey Morrow and Jillian Bohenek
Climate Office, Fall 2005 and Spring 2006
Alexis Phillips (left) and Julie Malingowski (right) receive the ZedX Weather Information Technology Award for their contributions to the Pennsylvania State Climate Office at the 37th Annual Penn State Department of Meteorology Spring Banquet held on April 18th, 2006.
At the end of the 2006 Spring semester, the Climate Office staff enjoyed lunch in downtown State College at The Sports Cafe. Here, Katie LaBelle, Joey Mays, and Alexis Phillips patiently wait for their food.
Julie Malingowski embraces the photo opportunity and is flanked by Sonya Miller and Steven Greybush.
A candid Paul Knight and Chad Bahrmann enjoy some social time with the Climate Office assistants.
