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the New Lenox Patriot | September 14, 2017 | 7
Troop 49 Scout turns love of meteorology into weather station for project
Visitors now can
check forecast at
Joliet’s Pilcher Park
Claudia Harmata
Editorial Intern
Achieving the rank of an
Eagle Scout — the highest
rank in Boy Scouts — is no
walk in the park.
However, Jacob Janssen is
determined to achieve it and
was inspired to help Pilcher
Park Nature Center in Joliet
for his Eagle Scout project.
“It’s a special place for
me because my grandfather
took us there as kids a lot,”
said Janssen, a Homer Glen
resident and member of New
Lenox Boy Scout Troop 49.
“We’d get hot dogs and go
run around.”
In order to become an Eagle
Scout, on of the requirements
of a Life Scout is to
plan, develop and give leadership
to others in a service
project that benefits an organization
in the community.
“He came to me looking
for an Eagle Scout project,”
said Katie Zaban, the Nature
Center superintendent
at Pilcher Park. “We talked
about the typical projects
— like building a bridge,
benches, signs — he was
kind of interested in those,
but then he said, ‘Well, I
want to be a meteorologist.
Would you be interested in a
weather station?’”
Janssen grew up interested
in meteorology, reminiscing
on the times he spent watching
storms from his garage.
“I’ve always enjoyed it
because when I was little —
we have a garage that opens
and it looks over a field —
we would watch the storms
roll in there,” he said. “I enjoy
it because it’s something
different every day.”
He wanted to share this
passion with the community,
so he decided to build
a weather station at Pilcher
Park — one that visitors and
the park could use.
“I started back in April or
May,” Janssen said. “I did
the paperwork and had to
send that in, and then from
there, it was just a matter of
getting some of the materials
fundraised and doing the actual
project.”
Ace Hardware in New
Lenox donated a lot of the
materials needed for the
project, according to Janssen.
Marina Cartage, Inc.
donated the wooden post
Janssen used to hold the
weather instruments.
“We had to use a post hole
digger and dig a hole just
below the frost line,” Janssen
said. “Then we had to
put cement there and stick
a wooden post into the cement.
Then we had to screw
the instrument panels on.”
The outside work of the
project took a day to complete.
Janssen later returned
to install indoor panels that
display the information the
weather instruments collect.
“It communicates with the
instruments that are outside,
and they give all the information
to the panel inside,”
he said. “It gives the temperature,
humidity, barometric
pressure, wind speeds, what
way the wind is coming
from and that kind of thing.”
According to Zaban, the
weather station is being utilized
by the summer camp
program at the park and will
also help the Little Sprouts
Early Learning Center during
the school year.
“We have [the panels] at
the front desk currently …
we have it on the heat index
setting, so if there was a really
hot heat index and it was
unsafe for our campers to go
outside for an extended period
of time we would use it
for that,” she said. “Once we
get into winter and windchill
is a factor, we will see that
as well and use it as a determining
factor if the [Little
Sprouts] can go outside for
an extended time.”
Zaban had only good
things to say about her experience
working with Janssen
on his Eagle Scout project.
“He was very friendly,
very easy to work with,”
she said. “He was basically
a self-starter, got what he
needed and he did it. He
showed me how to use the
weather station, and he is a
great kid all around.”
Janssen’s love for meteorology
is something that he
plans to pursue in college
— his top choices being the
University of Oklahoma and
Valparaiso University for
their meteorology programs.
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New Lenox Troop 49 Boy Scout Jacob Janssen built a weather station for his Eagle project
at Pilcher Park Nature Center in Joliet. Photo submitted
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