BERNE — A Doppler tower based in East Berne provides information to meteorologists from areas as far west as the Mohawk Valley, as far east as the Berkshires in Massachusetts and southern Vermont, as far north as the Adirondacks, and as far south as the mid-Hudson Valley. But for over two weeks the tower was out of service.

The Doppler radar system was repaired Wednesday afternoon, said Joe Cebulko, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Albany station. A device known as “bull gear” that allows the large, ball-like radar structure to rotate stopped working on Aug. 13 and had to be replaced, he said.

“It’s a pretty extensive process to replace the tech component,” said Cebulko.

A four- or five-person team was sent from the National Weather Service forecast office in Norman, Oklahoma, to replace and install the device, with assistance from the four technicians already serving as staff at the Albany station, which is located near the University at Albany on Fuller Road.

“They were actually working on a radar in Portland,  Maine,” said Cebulko, of the repair team.

Fixing the Doppler radar tower took days to complete, and involved bringing in a crane to lift off portions of the tower, he said.

In the meantime, the meteorologists based at the weather station in Albany used other means to predict the weather.

According to Cebulko, he and other meteorologists used surrounding radar from neighboring weather stations, the closest ones being in Binghamton, Burlington, Boston, and New York City. The range of the neighboring stations does overlap, he said, but it is preferable to use the stronger signal of their own station’s radar.

Meteorologists also used satellite imagery, forecast model data, and even lightning detection technology to track weather patterns as they awaited the repairs of the Berne station. Meteorologists may also collect data from volunteer observers who report back temperature and precipitation from where they live.

“There’s a full host of other data,” said Cebulko.

The Doppler radar tower detects weather patterns by emitting a signal that then bounces off “scatterers,” or various types of precipitation that reflect the signal back to the tower.

“So, if there’s less rain or smaller droplets, typically we’ll have lower reflectivity values,” said Cebulko. “Whereas, if there’s large precipitation droplets or a lot of it, then we’ll have those higher reflectivity values.”

Berne was chosen because it is a central location to the area the Albany station covers. He noted that its elevation is also at a happy medium.

“We don’t want to put the radar in the middle of a valley or on the top of a mountain,” he said.

When the 100-foot Doppler station was approved to be built on Cole Hill in 1993, it was met with local concerns over possible radiation contamination, after which testing was conducted by the National Weather Service a year later, which concluded it met radiation standards.

Cebulko said the station shouldn’t cause any harm with radiation.

“Radar beam shoots high enough where it’s not going to hit anyone on the ground,” he said.