About
About FBLTWX
FBLTWX (faribaultweather.com) is a weather page for Faribault and Rice County, Minnesota. It is run by Travis Kath, who lives in Faribault and reports rain and snow from his own gauge as CoCoRaHS The Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network: a nonprofit network of volunteers of all ages and backgrounds working together to measure and map precipitation. CoCoRaHS volunteer observer MN-RC-45.
Page reviewed Oct. 24, 2026
What FBLTWX is
- A weather page for Faribault and Rice County, Minnesota.
- Public weather data in one place: the National Weather Service forecast and warnings, radar, the airport's readings, weather models side by side, a sky camera, a storm log back to 1986 and the town's climate.
- Updated automatically on the site's own server.
What it isn't
- An official source. For warnings, follow the National Weather Service.
- Faster than the warnings. If one is issued, act on it even if this page hasn't caught up.
- The airport's rain gauge. Its rain sensor doesn't report reliably, so the site's rain totals come from Stage IV NCEP's hourly rain estimate on a 4 km grid: radar corrected with rain gauges by the River Forecast Centers. U.S. Geological Survey archive of the NCEP product.
| Source | What the site uses | How often | License or terms |
|---|---|---|---|
| Forecasts and warnings | |||
| National Weather Service (NWS) | the forecasts, the warnings, watches and advisories, and the airport's latest report | warnings every 2 minutes, the forecasts hourly, the airport every 10 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| NWS Weather Prediction Center (WPC) | the fronts on the home page's map | hourly | U.S. government data, public domain |
| NWS Storm Prediction Center (SPC) | the severe weather outlooks | every 30 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| NOAA Climate Prediction Center (CPC) outlooks and teleconnection indexes | the 6-to-10 and 8-to-14-day outlooks and the AO, NAO and PNA indexes | once a day, when they're issued | U.S. government data, public domain |
| Observations and radar | |||
| Faribault Municipal Airport (KFBL) | the airport's temperature, wind, pressure and sky | every 10 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| NWS Chanhassen radar (KMPX) | the local and county radar loops | every 5 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| NWS national radar mosaic | the regional radar loop | every 5 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| Iowa Environmental Mesonet | the airport's past readings, the warnings since 1986, the storm reports since 2004 and the NCEP Stage IV rain estimate | the storm log hourly, every 10 minutes during a Rice County warning; the airport's record and the rain estimate each night and morning | none stated, credited by name |
| CoCoRaHS (Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network) | a Rice County observer's rain and snow report for each day in the archive, MN-RC-45's first | each morning | CC BY 3.0, credited in the archive |
| Models | |||
| Aguacero Weather API (HRRR, NAM, GFS) | the HRRR, NAM, GFS, Euro and NWS grid forecasts saved for the report card, and a backup for the airport and the HRRR | once a day; the backups only when the first source fails | used with the site's own key, credited by name |
| Euro model data © ECMWF, CC BY 4.0 | the Euro model's forecasts, through Open-Meteo | when a new run is out (checked every 30 minutes) | CC BY 4.0 |
| Open-Meteo forecasts, ensembles and upper-air data (CC BY 4.0) | every model's forecast, the ensembles and the upper air | when a new run is out (checked every 30 minutes) | CC BY 4.0 |
| Rivers | |||
| U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), including its daily flow statistics | the Cannon and Straight river levels | every 15 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| NOAA National Water Prediction Service (NWPS) | the rivers' flood stages | every 15 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| Climate | |||
| ACIS / Faribault co-op station | the records, the season's snowfall and the long climate record | once or twice a day; the full record monthly | U.S. government data, public domain |
| NOAA NCEI 1991–2020 normals | the normals | once a year | U.S. government data, public domain |
| Sky and air | |||
| NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) | the northern lights forecasts and the solar wind | every 5 to 30 minutes | U.S. government data, public domain |
| U.S. Naval Observatory (moonrise, moonset and moon phases) | the home page's moonrise, moonset and moon phases | once a day | U.S. government data, public domain |
| Open-Meteo air quality | the air quality badge | every 30 minutes | CC BY 4.0 |
| Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) smoke forecast, through Open-Meteo | the night sky's smoke row | every 30 minutes | Open-Meteo's CC BY 4.0; CAMS credited by name |
| Kp index since 1932 from GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences (CC BY 4.0) | the aurora log | once a morning | CC BY 4.0, with its citation on the night sky page |
| Celestrak (space station orbits) | the space station's passes | at most once every 20 hours | none stated; its FAQ's rules followed |
| NASA eclipse catalogs: Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA's GSFC | the eclipses | entered by hand, never fetched | free to reproduce with that line, given word for word |
| International Meteor Organization meteor shower calendars | the meteor showers | entered by hand from each year's calendar | cited |
| PyEphem (sun, moon, planets and space station positions, computed here) | the sun, moon, planets and space station on the night sky page | computed on the server | MIT |
The same list is on Sources.
Credits and licenses
- Libre Franklin, the site's typeface: The Libre Franklin Project Authors, SIL Open Font License 1.1
- PyEphem 4.2.1, the sun, moon, planet and space station positions: MIT
- Viridis, the radar's color-blind-safe colors: from matplotlib
- The regional radar's base map: Natural Earth, public domain
- Faribault airport (KFBL): temperature, wind, pressure and sky (44.3247, -93.3108; the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's station list)
- Faribault Co-op station A National Weather Service station kept by a volunteer, who reads temperature and precipitation at home or work. National Weather Service glossary: the long climate record (44.3092, -93.2660; ACIS station records)
- Cannon River below Faribault (USGS 05354500): river level (44.3597, -93.2567; USGS)
- Straight River near Faribault (USGS 05353800): river level (44.2579, -93.2311; USGS)
- Chanhassen radar (KMPX): the local and county radar loops, 41 miles north-northwest of Faribault (44.8489, -93.5655; the NWS radar station list)
Not on the map:
- CoCoRaHS gauge MN-RC-45, Faribault 1.7 N: rain and snow
- The sky cam, in Faribault, looking southeast
The red square is Faribault, the site's point for the town. The dashed circle, 20 miles around it, is where the storm log's storm reports come from; its warnings are Rice County's.
| Feed | Newest data |
|---|---|
| NWS warnings and alerts | Updated 2:16 a.m. |
| NWS 7-day forecast | Updated 2:15 a.m. |
| NWS hourly forecast | Updated 1:17 a.m. |
| Faribault airport (KFBL) | Updated 1:35 a.m. |
| Radar (KMPX) | Updated 2:13 a.m. |
| Weather models | Updated 2:07 a.m. |
| SPC outlooks | Updated 2:08 a.m. |
| River gauges | Updated 2:04 a.m. |
| Air quality | Updated 2:12 a.m. |
| Storm log | Updated 2:03 a.m. |
| Sky cam | Updated 2:16 a.m. |
From the site's health check, rewritten every minute. A line goes gray when its feed is late, by the same limits the pages use.
The sky cam is in Faribault, looking southeast. It takes a picture every minute, and the home page shows the newest. Every hour from 6:50 a.m. to 10:50 p.m. the day's pictures so far become a timelapse, and the day's last one is made at 11:57 p.m. Full-size pictures are kept 7 days, and for good on a day with a Rice County warning or watch or a storm report in the county. Each day's timelapse is kept in the archive.
- Save. Each model's forecast high and low for the next seven days, once a day.
- Check. Each day against the Faribault airport's high and low, The airport's day Midnight to midnight standard time all year (1 a.m. to 1 a.m. in daylight time): the day the airport's high and low cover. This site's report card.
- Average. The misses over the last 30 days, 90 days and year, too warm or too cold alike. The smaller the average, the closer the model has been.
Which forecast has been closest over the last 30 days, from the Models page's report card:
No model has been clearly closest on highs over the last 30 days: GFS has been off by 2.9° on average and NAM by 3.1°, a gap smaller than their day-to-day ups and downs.
No model has been clearly closest on lows over the last 30 days: NAM has been off by 3.6° on average and HRRR by 3.7°, a gap smaller than their day-to-day ups and downs.
No model has been clearly closest on highs over the last 90 days: NAM has been off by 2.4° on average and ICON by 2.5°, a gap smaller than their day-to-day ups and downs.
No model has been clearly closest on lows over the last 90 days: NAM has been off by 3.0° on average and HRRR by 3.1°, a gap smaller than their day-to-day ups and downs.
NBM has caught the most rain days at day 1 over the last 90 days: 21 of 26 (tied with Euro; a tie goes to fewer dry forecasts, then the smaller amount miss).
No model has been clearly closest on highs over the last year: ICON has been off by 2.3° on average and NBM by 2.4°, a gap smaller than their day-to-day ups and downs.
No model has been clearly closest on lows over the last year: NBM and NAM have both been off by 2.9° on average.
NBM has caught the most rain days at day 1 over the last year: 65 of 83.
ICON has caught the most days with 1 inch or more of snow at day 1 over the last year: 5 of 9 (tied with NBM; a tie goes to fewer false alarms, then the smaller amount miss).
Over the last 90 days, 7 of the 8 models ran too cold on highs at the Faribault airport, by 1.2° to 2.0° on average.
Over the last 90 days, 7 of the 8 models ran too warm on lows at the Faribault airport, by 2.0° to 4.5° on average.
Over the last year, 6 of the 8 models ran too cold on highs at the Faribault airport, by 1.0° to 1.5° on average.
“Runs warm” or “runs cold” by a name: over the last 90 days that model’s day-1 forecast leaned that way by 1° or more on average, steadily enough to stand out from its day-to-day misses. It shows only when the period shown leans the same way by 1° or more.
“Runs warm” or “runs cold” by a name: over the last 90 days that model’s day-1 forecast leaned that way by 1° or more on average, steadily enough to stand out from its day-to-day misses. It shows only when the period shown leans the same way by 1° or more.
Ranked by each model’s Lead day How many days ahead a forecast was made: day 1 is the forecast for tomorrow. This site's report card Average miss How far a forecast high or low has been from the Faribault airport's reading, on average, whether too warm or too cold. This site's report card over the period shown, fewest degrees first; a model needs 7 days scored to be ranked. The NWS isn’t ranked.
Ranked by rain days caught at day 1, most first; a tie goes to fewer dry forecasts, then the smaller amount miss. A model needs 7 rain days to be ranked.
Ranked by days with 1 inch or more caught at day 1, most first; a tie goes to fewer false alarms, then the smaller amount miss. A model needs 7 such days to be ranked.
Updated Nov. 2, 8:30 a.m.
- Is this the National Weather Service?
- No. FBLTWX shows the National Weather Service's forecasts and warnings beside other public data, and it isn't an official source. For warnings, follow the National Weather Service.
- Why doesn't the site use the airport's rain gauge?
- The airport's rain sensor doesn't report reliably, so the site's rain totals come from NCEP Stage IV, a radar estimate corrected with rain gauges. The radar page's 24-hour rain layer is a separate radar estimate, labeled as one on that page.
- How often does it update?
- Warnings every 2 minutes, radar every 5, the airport every 10 and the forecasts every hour. Data sources, above, has every source and how often the site asks it.
- Which forecast has been closest?
- The report card above says, for the last 30 days; the Models page has the rest.
- How far back does the storm log go?
- Rice County's tornado, severe thunderstorm, flash flood and flood warnings from 1986, its winter storm, blizzard, heat, cold, wind and other zone warnings from 2005, and storm reports within 20 miles of Faribault from April 2004.
Name the site, the page and the day you saw it: FBLTWX, “Faribault Radar,” faribaultweather.com/radar.html, seen Oct. 24, 2026. The numbers come from the sources above, so name the source too when you use one: the National Weather Service for a warning, for one.
The site's own tests check these before each change goes live:
- Contrast. The words on every section bar's color at 4.5 to 1 or more (WCAG's AA level); on the red bar, only bold words 19 px or larger (AA for large text); the words on each temperature color at AA for their size.
- Touch. On a phone, every control on the radar page is at least 44 px tall and wide.
- Keyboard. On this page, every link and button can be reached with the Tab key and shows an outline when it has focus.
- Reading. No text under 12 px on screen on the home, radar, 7-day, night sky, models, storm log, climate, winter and About pages; no section heading on two lines on a phone; no time split from its a.m. or p.m.; links in running text underlined, on every page.
Something hard to use? Say so through Contact, below.
- Oct. 25, 2026 About: this page, rebuilt, with the sources as a table, how fresh each feed is, a map of where the numbers are measured and the report card's verdicts.
- Oct. 24, 2026 Radar: on wide screens the map fills the space beside its controls, and a 24-hour rain layer, a radar estimate, can take the loop's place.
- Oct. 23 to 24, 2026 Radar: a county view, a 6-hour loop, colors for color blindness, a list of the warnings on the map, storm reports drawn on it, a check against the airport's report, full screen, and a link that keeps the view.
- Oct. 22 to 23, 2026 Climate: the page redesigned, and the archive in its new look. The airport's day now runs midnight to midnight standard time across the site.
- Oct. 20, 2026 Models: the report card says which model has been closest, and How sure names the least certain call in the week ahead.
- Oct. 18 to 19, 2026 Storm log and storm days: the log of every Rice County warning since 1986, and each storm day's page, redesigned.
- Oct. 17, 2026 Today's weather: the home page redesigned. How it works: each page's rules in one place.
- Oct. 16, 2026 7-day forecast: its new look. Night sky: a banner on every page while the northern lights are active and the sky is clear.
Each page's rules and sources, and how the forecast report card is scored, are on How Faribault Weather works.
Questions, corrections or a station to add:
FBLTWX is built and run by FarNorth.Tech.
FBLTWX runs on its own server: Python 3.12 (with requests, APScheduler, Pillow and PyEphem) gathers and draws everything, ffmpeg makes the videos, and nginx serves the pages through a Cloudflare Tunnel. The type is Libre Franklin. The version below is the last change to what visitors load.
Version d97d45a