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Nicholas123

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Looking forward to a wonderful weekends sailing.The forecast was wonderful & all set to go then at about 5 this morning the sound of rain hammering on the roof followed at seven by thunderclaps :(.
Turned on the radio to hear the weather bloke in London say everything's rosy but there might be the possibility of rain & the odd thunderstorm towards the end of the day.Don't they ever look out the window!:eek:

Makes you realise how much danger there is in relying on a centralized system.....I suppose that's the weekend stuffed.:rolleyes:
 
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Living about 2km from the Met Office I can confirm that it is lovely in Exeter!

I've been lucky to have had a few tours of the Met Office and they assure me they do look out of the window, personally I am not so sure!
 
That was one hell of a downpour that passed across us this morning and the thunderstorm was rolling around for about an hour or so - got really close at one point. Forecast for the weekend (and the rest of the day) still says sun, sun, sun so let's hope it's right!
 
There is a live weather station at the marina where our boat is and I can confirm that is reading completely differant to the forecast currently on XC weather for 13.00 today.....just goes to confirm that they cant tell you what the weather was like yesterday with any accuracy never mind tomorrow/next week.....!
 
....Attended a joint conference of the RIN/RMetSoc some years ago on 'Weather and Sailing'. One of the speakers gave an intriguing presentation, against the wishes of some of his pro meteorologist colleagues, comparing the effectiveness of various forms of forecast.

It was readily demonstrated that 'Forecasting for today what we had yesterday' was, statistically, far more accurate and reliable than any other method - including those using expensive supercomputers, expensive buildings to house them, and expensive staff to support them. From the strained silence around the lecture theatre it was apparent that most of his colleagues knew of this uncomfortable reality, but preferred not to mention it in polite company....
 
I am doing a major refit on my boat - ashore for the season - and relied on the forecast ' spiffing weather until Sunday evenening at least ' so took the forehatch off.

Yesterday I was woken by thunder & lightning at 03:00 which carried on to 10:00, just as well I put a cover over the boat...:rolleyes:

Forecasters must have been girlfriends in a previous life.
 
It was after I'd read James Gleick's book Chaos many years ago that I began to realise why weather forecasting is so difficult. As a rough example, the next time you're in your kitchen turn on the cold tap. Slowly at first so the water flow is laminar. It is pretty simple at this point to forecast what the water flow will do if you just nudge the tap open (or closed) a tiny amount because the relationship between water-flow and tap-opening is linear. Now open the tap until the water gushes out, the flow now is no longer laminar it's chaotic. It's now exceedingly difficult to forecast what the water flow will do if you open (or close) the tap a tiny amount because the relationship between water-flow and tap-opening is no longer linear.

The weather is chaotic, just like the gushing tap, so a tiny change in one place leads to big changes elsewhere (the butterfly flapping it's wings...etc.). I'm surprised they do as well as they do to be honest!
 
Nicholas123 said:
Looking forward to a wonderful weekends sailing.The forecast was wonderful & all set to go then at about 5 this morning the sound of rain hammering on the roof followed at seven by thunderclaps :(.
Turned on the radio to hear the weather bloke in London say everything's rosy but there might be the possibility of rain & the odd thunderstorm towards the end of the day.Don't they ever look out the window!:eek:

Makes you realise how much danger there is in relying on a centralized system.....I suppose that's the weekend stuffed.:rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Your comment is odd because when i listened to BBC last night they said rain in parts of the south( covering the solent) overnight & early morning
Currently the BBC website is not saying rain for tonight
In fact by now 09-30 you should be seeing good weather
I am miles away so cannot see but have you looked out of the window in the last half hour?

This is no criticism of the op but it is amazing how many people do not listen to some forecasts correctly
At our yacht club it is blatantly obvious that sailors pick out bits which suit them & ignore the rest
I am possibly guilty of this. I look at several internet forecasts & tend to believe the one that suits me best
Normally i end up suffering as a result

That being said ---most forecasters should be stood against a wall & shot
 
Daydream believer said:
This is no criticism of the op but it is amazing how many people do not listen to some forecasts correctly...
Click to expand...

Equally, it's clear that the OP and his chums in weather cynicism are, far from promoting their own case, bolstering that of forecasters. The thread arose because someone thought the gulf between forecast and reality in their locality was remarkable. So when was the last similar post: a month ago, three months, six? In between times, the disparity has evidently not been sufficiently remarkable for anyone to hit a keyboard in anger.
 
Tony Cross said:
It was after I'd read James Gleick's book Chaos many years ago that I began to realise why weather forecasting is so difficult. As a rough example, the next time you're in your kitchen turn on the cold tap. Slowly at first so the water flow is laminar. It is pretty simple at this point to forecast what the water flow will do if you just nudge the tap open (or closed) a tiny amount because the relationship between water-flow and tap-opening is linear. Now open the tap until the water gushes out, the flow now is no longer laminar it's chaotic. It's now exceedingly difficult to forecast what the water flow will do if you open (or close) the tap a tiny amount because the relationship between water-flow and tap-opening is no longer linear.

The weather is chaotic, just like the gushing tap, so a tiny change in one place leads to big changes elsewhere (the butterfly flapping it's wings...etc.). I'm surprised they do as well as they do to be honest!
Click to expand...

If one watched the gushing tap as long as weather forecasters have been watching the weather you would find that you could jolly soon predict exactly what the water will do for any amount the tap is open. In fact a school kid would probably write a computer programme to do the predictions very easily & for a lot less
Considering the information & data available worldwide which they can call on it is amazing they cannot get a lot better than they currently are
 
Daydream believer said:
If one watched the gushing tap as long as weather forecasters have been watching the weather you would find that you could jolly soon predict exactly what the water will do for any amount the tap is open. In fact a school kid would probably write a computer programme to do the predictions very easily & for a lot less
Considering the information & data available worldwide which they can call on it is amazing they cannot get a lot better than they currently are
Click to expand...

You might think that....I couldn't possibly comment.
 
Daydream believer said:
Your comment is odd because when i listened to BBC last night they said rain in parts of the south( covering the solent) overnight & early morning
Currently the BBC website is not saying rain for tonight
In fact by now 09-30 you should be seeing good weather
I am miles away so cannot see but have you looked out of the window in the last half hour?

This is no criticism of the op but it is amazing how many people do not listen to some forecasts correctly
Click to expand...

Why are you talking about a time subsequent to the time I posted about confusing the whole issue?:confused:
Crazy.
 
Daydream believer said:
Your comment is odd because when i listened to BBC last night they said rain in parts of the south( covering the solent) overnight & early morning
Currently the BBC website is not saying rain for tonight
In fact by now 09-30 you should be seeing good weather
I am miles away so cannot see but have you looked out of the window in the last half hour?

This is no criticism of the op but it is amazing how many people do not listen to some forecasts correctly
At our yacht club it is blatantly obvious that sailors pick out bits which suit them & ignore the rest
I am possibly guilty of this. I look at several internet forecasts & tend to believe the one that suits me best
Normally i end up suffering as a result

That being said ---most forecasters should be stood against a wall & shot
Click to expand...

If i have miss understood the timings then apologies
However, the remainder of the post was relevant
Although perhaps i should have added misreading posts to mis reading forecasts
 
You know that forecasters do their best with complex mathematical models to give us some idea about how things MAY be; there are caveats about wind strength (gusts may be 40% greater than forecast) and wave height (may be double that forecast) so we have to use our own skill to make a more refined prediction for our own location. Use the synoptic chart, GRIB data and anything else available, including local knowledge and make your own decisions. The forecasters do not MAKE the weather :)
 
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