Shipping Forecasts again

Robin

Robin

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I've posted similar comments before but this is today's comparison between British and French for the English Channel. As you can see the UK forecast as it so often does lumps everything in one basket from Thames to Plymouth, whereas the French one has a different forecast for the Eastern Channel to that of the Central and Western parts (Casquets and Ouessant) whilst singling out the '7' just for the very eastern end and the Dover Straits area.

Not saying one forecast is more accurate than the other either way but it does illustrate how IMO our UK Shipping forecast as broadcast is nearly always far too generalised in area and timing (note the French one refers to the increase in the afternoon) to be of much use. I have friends waiting to cross from Dartmouth to Camaret and the UK forecast would perhaps suggest prudence (E or NE 5 or 6 but with a 7 in an included broadcast area) whilst the French one says OK to go (NE 4 to 5). Both forecasts are for the whole Channel offshore, not their respective coastal sides of it.


1/ Situation générale le mercredi 24 juin 2009 à 00h UTC et évolution:Anticyclone 1033 hPa au nord-ouest immédiat de la Norvège, quasi stationnaire, prévu 1030 hPa la nuit prochaine, puis évoluant peu. Dépression 1013 hPa à 350 milles à l'ouest de la Corogne, quasi-stationnaire, prévue 1008 hPa la nuit prochaine, puis 1007 à 250 milles au nord-ouest de La Corogne demain vers midi.


2/ Prévisions par zones valables jusqu'au jeudi 25 juin à 06h UTC:CASQUETS,OUESSANT Est à Nord-est 4 à 5. Mer peu agitée à agitée.


2/ Prévisions par zones valables jusqu'au jeudi 25 juin à 06h UTC:TAMISE,PAS DE CALAIS,ANTIFER Est à Nord-est 4 à 5, fraichissant 5 à 6 l'après-midi, passagèrement 7 sur PAS DE CALAIS et ANTIFER, puis mollissant 4 à 5 en fin de nuit. Mer peu agitée à agitée.

Humber Thames Dover Wight Portland Plymouth:
East or northeast 5 or 6, occasionally 7 at times in Thames, Dover and Wight. Slight or moderate. Fair. Moderate or good.

Not good enough in my book in the 21st century.
 
Interesting.
I went down-Channel from Boulogne last week, along the French coast. Actual wind each day pretty well matched the French forecasts posted in HM's office windows and was consistently much less than the UK forecast was giving.
There was one exception to this - UK forecast gave Dover/Wight/Portland F5 incr F6, French forecast gave 3-4, but the actual for 5 hours of the period was flat calm!
 
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Not good enough in my book in the 21st century.

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can't we just accept that the Frogs are btter at somethings than us?
Agreed, our shipping forecasts are cute and poetic.... but they are pretty ruritarian: a bit like the Slough to Windsor branchline compared to the TGV Atlantique.
 
Agree totally!
Like most things the weather is being eased gently to the door of privatisations, or becoming an agency - with more attention being paid to the directors incentive schemes than the quality of the product they have a statutory obligation to deliver.

Sad when Accuweather and almost any other web based forecaster can outperform the Met - and they are free.

Oh! I do feel much better now
 
I know that for the Irish Sea, another big area, quite often forecasts divide the are into Northern/Western/Southern Irish sea. Some of the forecasting seems to be very poor though, I've heard an Irish Sea forecast sat in a lifeboat station forecast F5 with the anemometer reading 30-35 knots. With the very low priority given to wind and synoptic charts in BBC forecasts the situation is a bit pathetic to say the least.
 
Presumably if we go digital in 2015 we will no longer have the luxury of getting a shipping forecast (at least by radio) when out to sea or abroad.

A good opportunity for the RYA to get get involved - since R4 LW will no longer be 'mainstream' the frequency will be 'freed up', so we can look forward to some much more useful forecasts from it. Either the forecast needs to go back to 5 minutes or we may as well hang seaweed from the shrouds.

What I do not understand is why the coastguard VHF broadcast needs to mimic this truncated radio broadcast.

Perhaps the EU should use the 198 frequency as a permanent european weather station (plus test match cricket of course), with forecasting done from France.
 
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French not always good. I've sat in a French port during a forecasted dry evening, while it was raining chats et chiens.

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Accuracy is another thing although I have found French forecasts especially the VHF coastal ones to be very good. What is much better in my book is that on the offshore ones they don't lump so many areas together spread over many hundreds of miles if not more at times that the resulting generalisation is a complete waste of time. Big ships don't really worry about a difference of say one Beaufort force more or less but us little ones and small fishing boats surely do. I would doubt that big ships with modern communications on board would even listen to the Shipping Forecast any more so us little boats are the real customers and for us the product is fairly crap.
 
I've also been very impressed by the Dutch inshore ones (broadcast in English every 4 hours).

Mind you, I also find the Met Office is pretty good. The trick is to spend all week at work trawling through the various weather sites reading their predictions (well, it beats working!). If they all give the same prediction, then you can be pretty sure of their accuracy, if they all differ, exercise caution!
 
Maybe this will help? I think I heard it described as, "a computer the size of Wales" on the Today programme. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
If it's a government computer it won't work /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

Might as well count on the Daily Mail for weather predictions
 
There isn't any point at all in having the biggest computer in the world or even the most accurate forecast if that forecast is then going to be condensed to a few lines covering a thousand miles! Our weather largely moves west to east and depressions at around 25mph average I believe so at the very least the timing of weather events from Plymouth/Biscay to say Humber/Thames has to be what 24hrs different and wind directions in the same scenario going from south or southwest via west to northwest at different times. Often the projected change in the generalised forecast say for in the Thames Dover bit of Humber Thames Dover Wight Portland Plymouth Biscay might be so far behind that in the Plymouth Biscay end to be left out of the former areas forecasts until the next published forecast.

I'm not explaining this very well but timings of wind shifts or windspeeds, and changes in visibility are of very great importance to small boats. In the past we used to get more data like station reports to judge where things were moving through, now it is all too much time and trouble. Maybe the BBC has more important things it thinks than the Shipping Forecast but as someone else pointed out the Coastguard at least could give out more on VHF. I suspect part of the reason is that what there is comes free from the Met Office and any more requires extra payment?

I still find it hard to accept that in the 21st century we have at best no better but actually LESS information than before via the Shipping Forecasts.
 
The thing that I'm surpised about is that we don't have a dedicated weather channel as they do in the US, given we, in the UK, spend a fair bit of time talking about the weather because it is so changeable.

The weather channel in the Florida Keys, for instance, runs a tape that is updated every hour or so and there the weather is almost entirely predictable. The forecast gives rain radar, wind speeds, 5 day forecast, etc for each of a number of areas in The Keys.

Ho-hum, perhaps there is a maket opportunity out there....
 
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Ho-hum, perhaps there is a maket opportunity out there....


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That there hits the nail on the head! In the USA they take the view that their taxes have already paid for things like weather forecasts once and there is no further charge for passing on the information.

Same goes for charts, where ALL the USA official charts and pilots are completely free to download and a charge is only made if you order a hard copy.

BTW if a few of us poodle into Keyhaven at the weekend can we all raft up on your mooring or alongside RS?

Just joking..... /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

PS BTW there are about 5,000 of us in Poole that aren't Solent based so there is life in the sticks too!
 
Ken, you beat me to it. The Solent will soon be making a bid to include everythnig to Weymuff in the West, Cherbourg and Aldernery in the sarf. We won't be bidding for anything in the East, it's all that muddy water don't you know...
 
Listen you we haven't forgiven Bournemouth yet for moving into Dorset! I'll have you knowas well that in forecast areas the Met Office and BBC say we are considered the South West. The Solent is well and truly in London and the South East, Poles apart.
 
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