39 replies to this topic

[BagOfCrisps]

They are pretty goddam accurate though!

[Mamabear]

6.6 this evening... well done!

[rach]

[skidaisuki]

The UK Met Office deserves credit - I think it's pretty accurate over the timescale that most people need real-world weather forecasts, i.e. the immediate day ahead and up to 3-5 days ahead. That's all that matters.

You have to be deluded to think that a medium-term forecast for specific weather conditions in a specific place in Britain, with all its changeable Atlantic weather and micro-climates, is likely to be right as a result of more than chance, based on seasonal averages.

And the fact that they are prepared to admit and acknowledge their limitations is actually quite admirable, in my view. A lot of other countries' met offices wouldn't be allowed do confess to such shortcomings, however deluded they might be in their confidence to predict accurately. Imagine the North Korean weather forecasters - they probably get sent to the gulag if they get it wrong, then the state media re-writes the forecast to make it "correct" in retrospect. Plus the despotic "Dear Leader" with the stupid hair gets the credit for sunny days, presumably.

SdS

[pie-eater]

They have done pretty good in the 10 days or so I have been here.
Been generally fantastic weather, good timing!

[TubbyBeaverinho]

well from memory the UK Met Office daily weather reports suck...often hashing up the weather. Could just be memory distortion though, I guess they should just stick to predicting it to be cloudy, they'd have a 99% chance of getting it right!!

[snowdude]

Well up until I finished living in the UK they couldn't get the weather right on the day let alone even a few days ahead. Do you mean to say they can actually get the forecast correct more than 1 hour ahead?

[TubbyBeaverinho]

thats my experience too Snowdude

[thursday]

c'mon, some of the most powerful computers in the world are employed in weather forecasting. They are as accurate now as they have ever been. (Meaning there is always romm for improvement in the future)

[TubbyBeaverinho]

so...they are still shite

[scouser]

They should use them for more useful stuff, like porn.

[Go Native]

The following is a pretty good summation of how current day forecasts are created.

Quote:

Once an all-human endeavor based mainly upon changes in barometric pressure, current weather conditions, and sky condition, forecast models are now used to determine future conditions. Human input is still required to pick the best possible forecast model to base the forecast upon, which involves pattern recognition skills, teleconnections, knowledge of model performance, and knowledge of model biases. The chaotic nature of the atmosphere, the massive computational power required to solve the equations that describe the atmosphere, error involved in measuring the initial conditions, and an incomplete understanding of atmospheric processes mean that forecasts become less accurate as the difference in current time and the time for which the forecast is being made (the range of the forecast) increases. The use of ensembles and model consensus help narrow the error and pick the most likely outcome.

I've highlighted one of the main reasons as to why forecasting, especially for maritime climates like the UK, can be especially difficult. Some of you probably know that the models used for forecasting use a 3D grid over the region you wish to forecast for. How much computational power you have determines how fine the grid is. At each node in the grid they attempt to put in as much real observational data as possible. The more accurate this data generally the more accurate the forecast. For places like the UK where a lot of the weather comes out of the North Atalantic where apart from a few bouys there's very few actual real observations whether at the surface or through radiosondes. Much of the data intially is from satellite obs which generally aren't as accuurate as having a weather station ob. Anyway this is one of the reasons why UK weather isn't that easy to forecast.

[TubbyBeaverinho]

doesn't Japan have a maritime climate?

[muikabochi]

I read marmite there!

[muikabochi]

(Interesting GN)

[Go Native]

Originally Posted By: Tubby Beaver

doesn't Japan have a maritime climate?

Not really. To the west of us, where most of the weather comes from is the Asian continent. In winter especially we are dominated by continental air masses. Still the little bit of ocean between the continent and us does play a very important role in throwing in some moisture to the dry continental air to give us the stupid amounts of snow we receive.
During the summer Southern Japan especially is dominated by more maritime influences with a lot of the weather coming up out of the South China Sea.

[TubbyBeaverinho]

Originally Posted By: Go Native

Originally Posted By: Tubby Beaver

doesn't Japan have a maritime climate?

Not really. To the west of us, where most of the weather comes from is the Asian continent. In winter especially we are dominated by continental air masses. Still the little bit of ocean between the continent and us does play a very important role in throwing in some moisture to the dry continental air to give us the stupid amounts of snow we receive.
During the summer Southern Japan especially is dominated by more maritime influences with a lot of the weather coming up out of the South China Sea.

ah ok

[muikabochi]

Some weather people in the uk this week I read said that the country is on for a hot summer.

So pehaps time to get the brollies out!

[MikePow]

Summer turns then

[2pints,mate]

They were keen to point out that it was NOT a prediction from the Met office!