Every night during the TrueView forecast, we give the official temperature for Spokane from Spokane International Airport. In fact, almost all of the temperatures that we feature from around the Inland Northwest are airport readings. This often prompts the question: "why do you give the temperature at the airport, when no one lives there?"

The airport temperature is from the "Automated Surface Observation System" (ASOS for short). ASOS is the largest and most modern network of weather sensors in the world. They are extremely accurate, automated stations that record the sky condition, visibility, pressure, temperature, dew point, wind and precipitation accumulation, among other things. The temperature is taken about 5 feet above the ground by a shaded electronic temperature sensor. Home thermometers just can't compete!

The Federal Aviation Administration, the Department of Defense and the National Weather Service work together to maintain this network of weather-observing stations. This information is not only used for observations, but it is also fed into the computer models that help meteorologists make their forecasts. Pilots also depend on the information from ASOS for safe flights. That is why these sensors are located at the airport.

One of the limitations of the ASOS system is that not every town has one. That is the main reason why we can't feature every city in the KXLY viewing area on our current conditions map. However, the system is always expanding. You can check in with the various observation sites around the Inland Northwest by CLICKING HERE.