[clearcarbon]

How long has NOAA been measuring temperature to hundredths of a degree Fahrenheit?

[Sacajaweau]

What a joke. The temperature deviates all day long and is constantly on the move. The average is an average of an average of a MOVING average...incalculable.

[mellow velo]

Great point! (and one I've used often) Not even 100 years ago, we were still using mercury-filled thermometers with tiny lines painted/etched onto the sides to measure temps. How the heck can anybody approximate the temperature to such a precise degree just by eyeballing a smudge on glass?!

And as another poster mentioned, these recording stations that used to be in a grassy field are now surrounded by asphalt parking lots or factories, in lots of instances.

[Leaning Right]

How long has NOAA been measuring temperature to hundredths of a degree Fahrenheit?

My first thought was: Is such a measurement at all reliable, even if it was done honestly? Certainly you can measure something to that precision. But wide fluctuations in the repeated measurements might render the "average" value meaningless.

[kiryandil]

How long has NOAA been measuring temperature to hundredths of a degree Fahrenheit?

The NOAA of the Roman Empire inherited the practice from the Chaldean & Assyrian NOAA, who got it from Egypt's NOAA, which switched to the Fahrenheit from the Hieroglyphic temperature system in 3000 BC...