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| Thread ID: 115297 | 2011-01-11 21:41:00 | What happened to our wet summer? | johcar (6283) | PC World Chat |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 1168984 | 2011-01-11 23:57:00 | Not sure where you got that pctek, but I suspect it's the usual "oops,-original-predictions-not-looking-like-they're-correct,-so-let's-change-our-position-and-hope-no-one-notices" position. . From the MetService. But as you know, it's hard to predict a week ahead, never mind a whole season. They just published the yera in review, hoteest, wettest, drieset, windiest etc. Interesting. There's a overall summary on their site too. Having been subjected to the revolting Akld humid jungle weather again and talking to people down there - who had hail the other day and were turning heaters on, I've noticed the extremes a bit more lately. |
pctek (84) | ||
| 1168985 | 2011-01-12 00:15:00 | We have had a couple of bits of rain over the last month or so. Not much really. Those weather guys should pay the salary back. They come on tv sounding like Professors and telling us what is going to happen. They cant even forecast 2 days head let alone 2 months. Just tell us that there is an El Nina or a La Nino and we'll work it out. And can someone please change the names of those weather patterns they are so hard to differentiate. |
Digby (677) | ||
| 1168986 | 2011-01-12 01:21:00 | We have had a couple of bits of rain over the last month or so . Not much really . Those weather guys should pay the salary back . They come on tv sounding like Professors and telling us what is going to happen . They cant even forecast 2 days head let alone 2 months . Just tell us that there is an El Nina or a La Nino and we'll work it out . And can someone please change the names of those weather patterns they are so hard to differentiate . Or La Niña and El Niño ( . wikipedia . org/wiki/El_Ni%C3%B1o-Southern_Oscillation" target="_blank">en . wikipedia . org) - easy to remember which is which . La Niña (the feminine one) is COLD: just like the look SWMBO gives you when you arrive home to tell her you've just <insert something related to your favourite hobby here> . . . :D |
johcar (6283) | ||
| 1168987 | 2011-01-12 02:22:00 | You forgot to mention La Ninja - that's the one that creeps up on you without you noticing, knocks you around a bit and finally kicks you in the stomach! :thumbs: | tuiruru (12277) | ||
| 1168988 | 2011-01-12 02:32:00 | To start with, consider that there are about 1019 m3 of air in the troposphere, and to perfectly predict the weather we would need to know the temperature, moisture, pressure, etc., of all of it. And a second later, all of that information would be outdated. That's not to mention the influence of the stratosphere, the large influence of the ocean (down to considerable depth when accounting for vertical transport) as well as the topography and conditions of the surface (e.g. snow and ice cover, soil moisture, albedo, and surface roughness). To incorporate all of those data into a computer model which could generate a weather forecast would be the next obstacle, assuming there were even a computer capable of handling that amount of data. We don't know everything there is about the atmosphere and its dynamics, so we can't write computer model algorithms to correctly simulate its physics. Additionally, the atmosphere is stochastic and behaves chaotically, which means that we cannot necessarily make predictions given accurate initial conditions. There is even some thought that the atmosphere cannot be mathematically described by the physics we're most familiar with. So consider that our data are extremely poor in quality and spatial and temporal coverage relative to the description in the first paragraph, and that we are a long way from the computing capacity to even generate a good forecast even if we were better able to understand the way the atmosphere works. This doesn't mean that it's hopeless, or that all forecasters are equally inept. There is definitely skill in forecasting, and experience helps a lot As to how far ahead it is practical to forecast, there’s a high degree of accuracy up to about three days. But after that, for four to seven days ahead, forecasts are less reliable. |
pctek (84) | ||
| 1168989 | 2011-01-12 02:39:00 | <snip>There is definitely skill in forecasting, and experience helps a lot <snip> In the good old days 'forecasters' were known as a shamans or soothsayers . And got about the same amount of guesses correct . They took payment and were successfully able to 'explain away', and this led to the beginnings of financial advisors, politicians, priests and meteorologists (including 'climatic disruption' experts) . . . . |
johcar (6283) | ||
| 1168990 | 2011-01-12 03:23:00 | Forcasting went out the window when they did away with the mk 1 eyeball instrument. These electronic stations never seem to get it right. "Its sunny", where mk 1 eyeball would see there is 80% cloud cover. | wotz (335) | ||
| 1168991 | 2011-01-12 03:48:00 | ...and here's me thinking they licked their finger and stuck it out of the window. | Marnie (4574) | ||
| 1168992 | 2011-01-12 04:08:00 | ...and here's me thinking they licked their finger and stuck it out of the window. Half right. Just not out the window. |
wotz (335) | ||
| 1168993 | 2011-01-12 04:14:00 | Maybe the pics below explain why Mexico get good weather and the Middle East doesn't ;) | tuiruru (12277) | ||
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