In the rugged mountainous areas, local rain and snow often come suddenly, posing huge challenges to transportation and agricultural production. Nowadays, with a batch of miniature rain and snow sensors the size of a palm being deployed at key points in mountainous areas, this passive response situation is being completely changed. These unremarkable “weather sentinels” have for the first time achieved minute-level response and millimeter-level quantitative monitoring of small-scale rain and snow phenomena in mountainous areas, pushing the accuracy of local weather warnings to a new height.
Solve the problem of “blind spots” in meteorological monitoring in mountainous areas
The terrain in mountainous areas is complex and the weather system is changeable. Traditional meteorological stations cannot achieve dense coverage due to high costs and difficult deployment, resulting in a large number of “blind spots” in monitoring. “Often, while the sky is clear on one side of the mountain, the road at the other end of the tunnel is already blocked by heavy snow,” said a person in charge of a highway section in a mountainous area of the United States. “By the time we discover the situation through manual inspection, the best opportunity to handle it has already been missed.”
The emergence of the new generation of micro rain and snow sensors has perfectly solved this problem. It adopts an integrated micro-electromechanical design, which integrates multi-modal sensing technologies such as laser ranging, capacitive sensing and optical recognition. It can not only keenly capture the start time of rain and snow, but also precisely distinguish the form of precipitation (rain, snow, sleet or hail) and calculate the intensity.
Technological breakthroughs: Smaller, smarter, and more energy-efficient
Professor Lin Fan, the project scientist, introduced: “Compared with the earlier products, the volume of this generation of sensors has been reduced by 80%, and the power consumption has been decreased by 60%, yet it can provide more diverse data dimensions.” The core breakthrough lies in directly completing data preprocessing at the chip end through AI algorithms, and only transmitting the most valuable results back to the control center, which greatly reduces the demand for communication networks.
This means that by simply using solar panels in conjunction with small batteries, sensors can operate independently for a long time in remote mountainous areas without electricity or Internet access, and transmit data back through low-power wide area network technology.
Practical Application: From “Post-event Response” to “Pre-event Warning”
In the first batch of applications in the Rocky Mountains, more than 300 micro-sensors have been installed at geological disaster hazard points, Bridges, tunnel entrances and alpine agricultural belts.
In the field of transportation, when sensors detect that the temperature on the bridge deck has dropped to the freezing point and precipitation begins to occur, the system will automatically trigger an alarm. The maintenance department can then carry out the operation of spreading de-icing agents before the road freezes, greatly avoiding traffic accidents.
Future Outlook: Building a “No blind spots in mountains and rivers” perception network
It is learned that the meteorological department has planned to cooperate with departments such as transportation, agriculture and tourism to promote the standardization and large-scale application of such micro-sensors, with the goal of building an intelligent perception network covering the major complex terrains across the country that has no blind spots in mountains and rivers.
“Over the next five years, our vision is to ensure that every geological disaster site, every key road, and every characteristic agricultural production area has such a ‘digital sense’,” Professor Lin Fan predicted. “This is not only a technological advancement but also a profound transformation of the traditional disaster prevention and mitigation system, ultimately achieving a leap from ‘large-scale forecasting’ to ‘hundred-meter-level early warning’.”
For more sensor information,
please contact Honde Technology Co., LTD.
WhatsApp: +86-15210548582
Email: info@hondetech.com
Company website: www.hondetechco.com
Post time: Sep-18-2025