silver-sub

Met office loses contract with the BBC, it was never very accurate anyway.
I wonder who will replace it? Reports saying maybe a foreign company.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2...sting-contract

hodgy0_2

what do you base that on?

Actual evidence - or just a "feeling"

Tony Harrington

iTrader: (8)

I generally found it pretty accurate personally.

silver-sub

Just personal experience.
Have ruined a few weekends away reading the forecast.

hodgy0_2

Obviously the further away the forecast the less accurate it will be

But that time/accuracy has been increased in the last 10 or so years

In reality with current technology/models the very maximum they can forecast, which any degree of confidence, is 5 days in the future, anything after that is increasingly speculative

In years past it was only 2 or 3 days

Personally (I am a sailor so have a strong interest) they are very good - they not only do a general forecast but much more focused and specialised ones - for sailing / flying

Today they had been spot on - said it would rain (where I am) at 2 o'clock and that is exactly what happened

wrx300scooby

I'm with silver sub on this one, I too have found their forecasts all too often unreliable.

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

LOL, the chairmen in the old boys/golf club must have had a falling out. Alcazar will be jumping about with glee I do have to admit why the the BBC or any other channel at that have so many different weather presenters; just use the news reader instead.

Just need the same to happen to the TV licensing authority (outdated money for the old boys establishment that can be easily be replaced via encryption and CAM modules using subscription smart cards; most decent TVs have a CAM slot for this purpose)

hodgy0_2

lol, with Alcazar's luck they will give the job to the same people the Daily Express use

BoozyDave

iTrader: (8)

I'd agree too.
On BBC news it says one thing, then on 'look north' it says something else

we have cancelled days out or not done thing's after seeing the weather forecast, only for it to be a great day

dpb

Magic seaweed is your friend

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

On the plus side; I've cancelled road trips in the Jag because of their forecasts. So they've saved me a few hundred quid in petrol

legb4rsk

I was on the south coast this weekend.On Saturday they said it would be dry Sunday morning & then rain later in the afternoon.
In fact it was the complete opposite!

silver-sub

It has improved somewhat over the years, early days were terrible.
Reminds me of this famous c*ck up!

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Finished dancing.....but yes, never found them even interested except for London and the SE..so long as THOSE were OK.......

The Trooper 1815

iTrader: (31)

Funnily enough many of the "independent" weather outlets get their source material from the Met Office.

The Met Office now own and run the most powerful weather forecasting and pattern prediction computers in the world. Just as the BBC go elsewhere, because of whinging license payers, the service they where receieving was getting better.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/news/rel...e/2014/new-hpc

hodgy0_2

they also (off course) publish their data around forecast accuracy

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us...racy/forecasts



"Global comparisons

The World Meteorological Organization compares similar statistics among national meteorological services around the world. These show that the Met Office is consistently one of the top two operational services in the world."

Turbohot

Now this thread is useless without your dancing vid in it. Please post it up.

BoozyDave

iTrader: (8)

I've been fibreglassing a roof today, you can't fibreglass if it's raining.

Last night the forecast said rain at 3pm, I thought we would have a decent day at it. This mornings forecast said rain at 1pm. I nearly cancelled the job. I didn't cancel and we got stuck in, keeping things covered up and working in smaller areas. The rain did come.....at 9pm!

It's not like they said 1pm yesterday and 3pm today (so acknowledging the rain was getting later)

it's been a fine day for fibreglassing, and we could have got loads more done and had less worries if they had said there would be a chance of rain from 6pm

BoozyDave

iTrader: (8)

today it said rain from 6pm, so thought we had a good day at fibreglassing.

it p1ssed it down at 2pm and ruined 10sq metres that had just been put down and wasn't cured.

dpb

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/weat...et-Office.html

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

But they apparently don't learn.

The last SIX Winter/Summer long range forecasts have been the EXACT opposite of what we actually got. Yet still, they spout their nonsense.

As my eldest says, "If you want to know what the weather is doing, look out the fookin window...."

jonc

This is more accurate and far more reliable than the Met Office.

dpb

Ideal

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Brilliant.

hodgy0_2

lol, i see the thickies are out in force

a forecast deals with the future - thats why it is called a "forecast" - and not simply "looking out the fooking window"

here we go

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forecasting

educate yourselves

markjmd

iTrader: (11)

The latest genius idea these clowns have come up with (both Met Office and BBC) is to display symbols on their forecasts that don't even match the written description directly below them. This evening in my area for example, they have a row of 10 consecutive cloud symbols for each hour from now until 5am tomorrow morning, with the following text below:
"Showers will die away for a time this evening with some clear spells for a time. Becoming cloudier late in the night with further, mainly light showers likely, especially in the east"

Anyone loading the app or the webpage and just skimming over it quickly glance might very easily think "right, no rain or showers, don't need waterproofs", which is exactly what I did on Tuesday afternoon when they did the same thing, and got a light soaking as a result.

Who have they got in charge there, some teenage work-experience bod on their summer holidays?

hodgy0_2

All ways best to read the text

I suspect the symbols/graphics are only really there for kids, the illiterate, and the stupid

They can never impart more than a very high level view

markjmd

iTrader: (11)

In actual fact, after just checking a minute ago, the app doesn't have a text description at all, so anyone using that can only rely on the symbols.

They have a symbol for showers, so if they're expecting some they should ****** well use it!

hodgy0_2

Lol, maybe it only rained in the "East", the weather symbol has to cover quite a wide area


Put a rain symbol on and you get the fvcktards in the west saying "I took an umbrella blah blah blah met office wrong again blah blah it did not rain here blah balh blah

The weather is complicated and does not work to a script

Best understood by grown ups

markjmd

iTrader: (11)

Yes, and a grown up would understand that these services have THREE different symbols, one for cloud, one for showers, and one for rain. Oddly though, you seem to be struggling with that concept. I wonder why that might be.