Met Office Local Weather Forecast

[Captn D]

I have just noticed that the Met office Weather Forecast for specific towns/locations, which previously was for 5 days ahead is now only for 3 days viz: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/forecast/gbumk9zss.

Have they given up on their longer term ability or is this a fault?

 

[[70521]]

Meto France will give you a free 14 day forecast on their great app. In my experience pretty accurate as well.

 

[Lucky Duck]

Just looked at one near me and its showing beyond 5 days

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/forecast/gcp185f25

 

[Captn D]

Falmouth now showing 7 days from tomorrow, but ignoring today. Must be a local phenomem!

 

[Angele]

Perhaps a fog descended on Exeter and they couldn't see beyond Thursday.

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

Meto France will give you a free 14 day forecast on their great app. In my experience pretty accurate as well.

Perhaps we live on different planets or sail in different waters. We spend about 4 months around Brittany, the Vendee and the Charente areas each year, Meteo France have not been particularly good. Even two days ahead the GFS regularly outprforms MF. I would not pay any regard to any forecast claiming any skill out to 14 days.

I look at forecasts up to 10 days ahead but only to see when forecasts 24 hours apart are giving consistent outcomes and to see how much successive forecasts ar 24 hour (perhaps 12 hour) intervals differ and if there is any trend in the outcomes. I practice what I preach in Reeds Weather Handbook.

 

[[70521]]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

Perhaps we live on different planets or sail in different waters. We spend about 4 months around Brittany, the Vendee and the Charente areas each year, Meteo France have not been particularly good. Even two days ahead the GFS regularly outprforms MF. I would not pay any regard to any forecast claiming any skill out to 14 days.

I look at forecasts up to 10 days ahead but only to see when forecasts 24 hours apart are giving consistent outcomes and to see how much successive forecasts ar 24 hour (perhaps 12 hour) intervals differ and if there is any trend in the outcomes. I practice what I preach in Reeds Weather Handbook.

I will bow to your greater knowledge on the topic, but when I pop my bow out of the river be that along the coast or over la Manche I've always found that Meteo France describe the conditions that I am experiencing and planned for. With the Met Office I need to working things out to bring it down to sea level, but miss the days when you could ring the local duty forecaster and get a proper forecast.

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I will bow to your greater knowledge on the topic, but when I pop my bow out of the river be that along the coast or over la Manche I've always found that Meteo France describe the conditions that I am experiencing and planned for. With the Met Office I need to working things out to bring it down to sea level, but miss the days when you could ring the local duty forecaster and get a proper forecast.

We had to turn back this morning to L'Aberwrac'h due to unpredicted fog in last night's forecast.

Weather centres were a great idea but unsustainable financially.

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I will bow to your greater knowledge on the topic, but when I pop my bow out of the river be that along the coast or over la Manche I've always found that Meteo France describe the conditions that I am experiencing and planned for. With the Met Office I need to working things out to bring it down to sea level, but miss the days when you could ring the local duty forecaster and get a proper forecast.

OK. I think that I know where you are coming from. It reminds me of “Never mind the quality, feel the width.”

The UK – MCA/HMCG/Met Office take the pragmatic view that marine forecasts are there to meet the requirements of the GMDSS. They are headlines written very much with safety in mind. They are concise with few wasted words. Weather is given as Fair except when it might affect wind or visibility.

If forecasts were longer, they would not fit into the 16 area, 3-hourly VHF time slot giving four new coastal forecasts a day. Longer shipping forecasts would not fit into the BBC 3 minute slot. Texts for NAVTEX would get curtailed.

The French take a different view. They issue two new forecasts a day and sometimes, but not always update the early morning forecast. Mostly, they have three broadcasts a day (5 from Cap de la Hague to Penmar’c.) They include information that is not necessary in a marine forecast. Do I really need to be told that it will start “nuageix” and become “trés nuageux,” even if they could get it reliably correct?

The weather centre concept was great in its day but economically unsustainable. Around the time of my retirement, even RAF fighter jet pilots were starting to self-brief. Just imagine the load if 10% of yachts sailing in the Solent all wanted to speak to a forecaster. Could Simon provide such a service and make a working proifi?

I am, of course, acting devil’s advocate but I am a cynical English sailor/meteorologist.

 

[johnalison]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I am, of course, acting devil’s advocate but I am a cynical English sailor/meteorologist.

I think, Frank, that you would be safer admitting to be an estate agent.

I don't trust forecasts beyond about three days, but sometimes it can be useful to see that "something nasty is coming along at the end of the week", or some such.

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I think, Frank, that you would be safer admitting to be an estate agent.

I don't trust forecasts beyond about three days, but sometimes it can be useful to see that "something nasty is coming along at the end of the week", or some such.

Taking one forecast in isolation, I agree. Watching forecasts in succession it is possible to make an assessment of how good the guidance is out to about 6 days ahead. Sometimes you can plan that far ahead with some confidence. At other times you can see that there is considerable uncertainty. In their ways, both can be useful information.

 

[Heckler]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

Taking one forecast in isolation, I agree. Watching forecasts in succession it is possible to make an assessment of how good the guidance is out to about 6 days ahead. Sometimes you can plan that far ahead with some confidence. At other times you can see that there is considerable uncertainty. In their ways, both can be useful information.

I see the BBC have finally seen sense and are using the Dutch service! Fed up of getting it wrong and maybe coming to the realisation that feeding climate change data in gives a garbage in, garbage out scenario!
Stu

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I see the BBC have finally seen sense and are using the Dutch service! Fed up of getting it wrong and maybe coming to the realisation that feeding climate change data in gives a garbage in, garbage out scenario!
Stu

Would yoi like to amplify that rather cryptic post?

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I recognise that there is much misunderstanding regarding MeteoGroup and, indeed, all private weather firms. That is what I can glean from Stu’s post. These are from the MeteoGroup website.

“MeteoGroup is a global private weather business with offices around the world, headquartered in London, UK. Founded in 1986, we combine experience and global coverage with local expertise to offer our customers highly accurate and bespoke weather services.”

I would challenge the "highly accurate" as no weather forecast can be highly accurate although that must depend on how you define accuracy and how you measure it.

Then -

“The basis of MeteoGroup's daily forecasts is the global ECMWF (European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting) model supplemented by global models run by the UK Met Office and US National Weather Service (GFS). Fine tuning the forecast is aided by independent high resolution mesoscale models run by the UKMO and MeteoGroup’s in-house WRF® model.*”

And

“One of the mesoscale models used by MeteoGroup is the Weather Research and Forecasting Model (WRF®). WRF® is an open source model and so MeteoGroup's MRD team works with it extensively, enhancing the model and adapting it for any location on the globe, at any vertical or horizontal resolution (500m to 100km). MeteoGroup runs the model in-house, twice a day.

In topographically challenging areas and extreme weather situations such as high wind speeds or extreme convection, WRF® has a clear advantage over global models as it factors in the effects of varying land use on the weather.

WRF® is highly flexible and has multiple uses. It is not only a tool for the forecast meteorologist but can also be used for hindcast studies, air quality studies, regional climate modelling and short term nowcasting”.


It is clear from this that forecasts provided my MeteoGroup will be no better than anything that we see now. Presentations might be more to your liking but that is likely to be all.

I do not whether or how much MeteoGroup contributes to the global meteorological infrastructure that we all pay for. This statement confirms my assertion the MG will be charging the BBC for services based on information that we pay for. In addition all observational data, land stations, ships, buoys, aircraft, radar, satellite etc are obtained and processed at costs to the public purse.

I am not suggesting in any way that MG are a cowboy outfit. They are highly professional. However, they can be no better than the data input.

 

[macd]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

Frank.
Wise words from a very clever bloke:
"It is harder to crack a prejudice than an atom."

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

Frank.
Wise words from a very clever bloke:
"It is harder to crack a prejudice than an atom."

Thanks, Mac. I am an eternal optimist. I also have a regrettable tendency to get annoyed when I meet willful ignorance.

 

[guernseyman]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I remember way back when the Met Office introduced long range forecasts, they got a lot of stick when they got it wrong, and stopped doing those forecasts.
Perhaps they tailor the local forecasts to a period ahead for which the probability is high.

 

[Heckler]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

Thanks, Mac. I am an eternal optimist. I also have a regrettable tendency to get annoyed when I meet willful ignorance.

I also have a tendency to get annoyed when I meet stubborn cranky old men with an inbuilt sense of their own importance and infallibility.
Stu

 

[macd]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

stubborn cranky old men with an inbuilt sense of their own importance and infallibility.

You're partly right: Frank is getting on a bit and he is a man. Otherwise I don't recognise a single one of those allegations as true. In fact, quite the reverse.

Ignorance is unfortunate but tolerable. Glorying in it is tragic.

 

[franksingleton]

Re: Met Office Local Weather Forecast and the

I also have a tendency to get annoyed when I meet stubborn cranky old men with an inbuilt sense of their own importance and infallibility.

Stu, there is an old saying - "No names, no pack drill." And one about wearing caps that fit. But, having seen many of your posts, I cannot say that I have been overly impressed by your knowledge of weather. I asked you to amplify your rather cryptic post earlier. You might try and show us what you really do know.