Sick of poor weather forecasting - what do you use ?

[Séamas M.]

Or here in Ireland one looks outside.  If you can't see the mountains it's raining.  If you can see the mountains it's going to rain. 

Bit hopefully not on Sunday.

[GruB]

Ok, I'm giving MetOffice gadget a go.

[YahudaMoon]

Is it raining in Yorkshire tomorrow (today) as it's gone 12 o clock.  The weather reports look dodgy again ?

[Peter]

Use a leaf....... 100% accurate.

Put it outside.....

If it gets wet ....its raining
If it is dry...........its not raining

Now place it on a solid surface and close your eyes - count to 5 and re-open....

If it is still there when you look, it isn't windy
If you can't find the leaf its windy

The Rochdale variant (and most of the Pennine area):


Use a leaf....... 100% accurate.

Put it outside..but glue it down because it's windy...

If it gets wet ....it's raining
If it is dry...........it's going to rain

[Kim]

I squint at the latest satellite images and rainfall radar on meteox.co.uk, and make my own guess as to what the weather's going to do.  This works fairly well for "If I go out this afternoon, will I get soaked?" purposes.  Anything else is witchcraft, and like any good cyclist I just shop around for the forecast that justifies the decision I was going to make anyway.

[YahudaMoon]

Lol.

 Is it ever dry & sunny in Yorkshire for more than two hours. Left Manchester last week in beautiful sunshine at 8 am. Crossed the Lancashire border into Yorkshire and its grim cloud, fog & rain. Back into Manchester it's all sunshine again.

This happens a lot for me or maybe I'm just unlucky ha ha. Oh and who first said 'The rolling hills of Yorkshire' there only rolling if your a car driver.

Ive got unfinished cycling buisiness in Ilkley so having a moan.

[Kim]

Is it ever dry & sunny in Yorkshire for more than two hours. Left Manchester last week in beautiful sunshine at 8 am. Crossed the Lancashire border into Yorkshire and its grim cloud, fog & rain. Back into Manchester it's all sunshine again.

Sounds like you've got the polarity on your weather reversed.  Check the connections.

[YahudaMoon]

Could move to Yorkshire then ? ha ha

Saying that I'd never go out out cycling as it's always raining in Yorkshire as far as I'm aware. Some people purposely move there for the cycling ? Odd. Or maybe they enjoy hills n rain ?

[GruB]

Metcheck has been fairly reliable - more so than the BBC News.

[klaas]

I use the Weatherpro and Celcius apps on the iPhone. The latter you can upgrade to get wind, pressure, and temperature maps. Wish there was an app that would show the jet-stream and fronts as well. Anyway, you always have to interpret weather forecasts.

[Freya]

I use xcweather which is ok, but none of them are reliable beyond about 18 hours ahead

[AndyK]

Re: Sick of poor weather forecasting - what do you use?

I look out the window. 100% accurate.


Seriously, I have two apps on my phone: Accuweather and the BBC Weather app. The former is far more accurate than the latter.

[Wendy]

WeatherPro for the iPhone - it's an excellent app, and the company does a better interpretation of the Metoffice rain radar data than the metoffice themselves.  That and the Metoffice together give a pretty good indication.

The key is to use the rain radar to predict what is likely in a few hours, and rely less on forecasts.  Definitely don't bother with anyone's forecast that is for longer than 12 hours ahead.

Metcheck has been fairly reliable - more so than the BBC News.

Except I refuse to use it any longer because, I believe, the owner has a paedophile type conviction.

[marcusjb]

Metcheck has been fairly reliable - more so than the BBC News.

Except I refuse to use it any longer because, I believe, the owner has a paedophile type conviction.

Apparently so.

Without wishing to sound all Daily Mail, I have a problem using a website associated with someone convicted of raping a 14 year old boy.

[Jasmine]

Re: Sick of poor weather forecasting - what do you use?

I look out the window. 100% accurate.

Me too.  If I look out of both sides of my flat I can predict the weather for at least the next 5 minutes.  Forecasting for North Wales is notoriously crap, even very short range - 2-3 hours.  I'm not convinced there's actually a monitoring station locally as the 'current weather' is usually also wrong!

[clarion]

Use a leaf....... 100% accurate.

Put it outside.....

If it gets wet ....its raining
If it is dry...........its not raining

Now place it on a solid surface and close your eyes - count to 5 and re-open....

If it is still there when you look, it isn't windy
If you can't find the leaf its windy

The Rochdale variant (and most of the Pennine area):


Use a leaf....... 100% accurate.

Put it outside..but glue it down because it's windy...

If it gets wet ....it's raining
If it is dry...........it's going to rain

Dales weather is easy to read.

Put your hand out of the window for 30s.

If it comes back with chunks knocked out of it, then it's raining.

If it comes back burned & blistered, then the sun is out.

There is no other type of weather in the Dales.

Oh - wind.

It's windy.

[nicknack]

Metcheck has been fairly reliable - more so than the BBC News.

Except I refuse to use it any longer because, I believe, the owner has a paedophile type conviction.

Apparently so.

Without wishing to sound all Daily Mail, I have a problem using a website associated with someone convicted of raping a 14 year old boy.

It's pretty old news though. He's been in prison for the last couple of years and likely to remain there for somewhat longer. So it's no longer anything to do with him. If you're ok with guilt by association then fine.

[Wendy]

Association, or ownership?  Last I knew he still owns the site, but I could be totally wrong?

[Ian H]

...Forecasting for North Wales is notoriously crap, even very short range - 2-3 hours. 

I expect that's similar for many hilly areas where weather can have significant localised variations.

[SlowCoach]

like any good cyclist I just shop around for the forecast that justifies the decision I was going to make anyway.

I'm with Kim on this one. I prefer the different weather forecasts to be radically different, because you just choose the one you want and hope for the best. When they all say the same thing, and it's not what you want to hear - where do you go next?

[Kim]

When they all say the same thing, and it's not what you want to hear - where do you go next?

For a bike ride

[Doosh]

This Norwegian site seems pretty accurate for me so far:

Hourly forecast for  South Normanton in England (United Kingdom) – yr.no

Just showing a heavy downpour and that's exactly what we've just had, with the sun just breaking through.

[Simonb]

I'm not aware of any poor weather forecasting. On the whole it's pretty accurate, but it's not an exact science. Very occasionally it's plain wrong.

Is it any worse than it used to be? No.

I always use the Met Office (BBC). Weather forecasting is an important resource, so I'd rather support a (mostly) publicly-funded service.

As Michael Fish once pointed out, "If the Met Office always gets it totally wrong, just interpret their forecasts to be the exact reverse and you'll be okay!" Or something.

[clarion]

When they all say the same thing, and it's not what you want to hear - where do you go next?

For a bike ride

Post of the Day.

Today.

And Every Day.

[recumbentpanda]

Optimism.


(Bad weather always looks worse from indoors)