Philip M. Craig

Philip M. Craig is a researcher affiliated with the National Centre for Atmospheric Science (NCAS) at the University of Reading, UK. He is actively involved in the rescue and digitization of historical meteorological data, contributing to climate science through archival data recovery.

His research focuses on historical climatology, particularly the transcription and quality control of 19th-century weather observations. He utilizes citizen science platforms such as Zooniverse to engage volunteers in large-scale data digitization projects. His work enhances global climate datasets like the International Surface Pressure Databank and supports reanalyses such as the 20th Century Reanalysis.

The primary trend in his research involves recovering instrumental weather data from handwritten archives, with a strong emphasis on sub-daily pressure, temperature, and rainfall observations from Western Europe and Canada during the 1861–1875 period. His publications highlight methodologies for data collection, quality assurance, and integration into modern climate models.

Philip M. Craig has contributed to significant scientific efforts in data rescue, demonstrating the reliability of volunteer-transcribed data through comparisons with existing datasets and reanalysis models. His work supports improved understanding of historical extreme weather events and long-term climate trends.

He collaborates closely with Dr. Ed Hawkins and is supported by funding from the NERC GloSAT project and the UK National Centre for Atmospheric Science. His research involves partnerships with institutions such as the UK National Meteorological Archive and local history societies for metadata verification.

He is involved in projects hosted on the Zooniverse.org platform, which facilitates large-scale public participation in scientific data transcription. These initiatives are crucial for unlocking inaccessible historical records and making them available for global climate research.