History of Old Weather in Timeline

By Popular Timelines Editorial Team · Updated: March 27, 2026

Old Weather is a citizen science project where volunteers digitize historical weather observations from mid-19th century ship logbooks. The project contributes to initiatives like Atmospheric Circulation Reconstructions over the Earth and has provided data for multiple climate reanalysis projects, including HURDAT, SODA, and ECMWF. Old Weather received the Royal Meteorological Society IBM Award for Meteorological Innovation that Matters in February 2013.

1912: Whaling Ships Project Timeframe

The Old Weather project focuses on whaling ship logbooks that sailed Arctic seas from 1849 to 1912.

October 2010: Phase I Launched

In October 2010, Phase I of the Old Weather project was launched, initiating the transcription of Royal Navy logs.

2010: Volunteer transcription of historical weather data started

Starting in 2010, volunteers at Old Weather transcribed historical weather data and naval events from logbooks of Royal Navy ships.

July 23, 2012: Volunteer Transcription Milestone

On July 23, 2012, 16,400 volunteers had officially transcribed weather data from 1,090,745 pages of log books from 302 ships.

October 2012: Phase III Launched

In October 2012, Phase III of the Old Weather project, focusing on US ship logs from the Arctic and worldwide, was launched.

2012: Volunteer transcription continued

From 2010 to 2012, large numbers of online volunteers at Old Weather transcribed historical weather data and naval events from logbooks of the 314 Royal Navy ships of the World War 1 era.

February 2013: Awarded Royal Meteorological Society IBM Award

In February 2013, the Old Weather project received the Royal Meteorological Society IBM Award for Meteorological Innovation that Matters.

August 2018: Phase III Completed

Phase III of the Old Weather project was completed on August 6, 2018.

2019: US Navy Ships Project Completed

In 2019, the Old Weather project to collect data from ship logs of 19 US Navy ships in World War II was completed.

2023: Project ongoing as of end of 2023

As of the end of 2023, the Old Weather U. S. Federal Ships project is still ongoing, with 248 ship/years processed and over 7.6 million weather observations digitized.