UKC

I'm staying in Llanberis over the weekend and am looking to get out bouldering, probably at wavelength boulders. Depending on which forecast I look at depends on whether this is possible.  A number of them have it as likely raining, a number have them as a low percentage possibility of rain. The question therefore is where do you go for your forecast? What's proved reliable for you over the years.

In reply to Jackspratt:

I usually look at two or three different ones then pick the one I like best...

In reply to Oceanrower:

Awesome, I've found one on accuweather which suits me so I'll disregard the others. 

In reply to Jackspratt:

Accuweather’s precipitation forecast feature for the next 120 mins is a handy feature. 

In reply to Jackspratt:

I tend to use met office for forecasts beforehand and then their rainfall radar on the day to see what has recently happened. Weather in those Welsh valleys is hard to predict though, and often low cloud will cause mizzly rain on those boulders when it is ok lower down. Porth Ysgo is a long way but I think it is often dry when the Valleys are misty and the rock is amazing. I can particularly recommend "Ugly Women" (6b).

In reply to Jackspratt:

If I'm staying in the area, I use the famed "look out the window" method personally

In reply to Jackspratt:

When forecasts don't match it basically means they don't know when an event is going to happen. Usually all the different forecasts have rain or sun (or whatever) taking place in a 12/24 hour period but just disagree on when. This is just the nature of the unstable weather we having at the moment. Best bet is look at lots of forecasts and then essentially take the average  so if more say it will rain at 1200 than dont that is probably the likely our come. 

check out Meteoblue and Windy.com. I use these to help out with my paragliding. 

In reply to Jackspratt:

I like Windfinder for coastal stuff and Ventusky for its visuals.

In reply to Oceanrower:

I'm going to make millions out of a "compare the market" weather forecast site.

In reply to Jackspratt:

I had to laugh at this in my newsfeed. Quite the most ridiculous piece of clickbait ever, based on an Accuweahter  forecast (note the date in the article ).

Express.co.uk: London snow alert: Exact day capital should expect to be crippled by snow - forecast. https://www.express.co.uk/news/weather/1204885/London-snow-alert-uk-snow-la...

In reply to Max factor:

The Daily Express weather forecasts are a disgrace. I dont know how they get away with it. Particularly as weather is so important to people and their lives. Why are we surrounded by such drivel.

In reply to Slackboot:

Thing is, it’s not the Express making the forecast as such. They rely on meteorologists as much as any other publication or broadcaster, but they do deliberately pick up on the ‘extreme’ end of the modelled forecasts hence the usual ‘worst winter ever’ etc that we see. It’s the weathermen and their machines that put these possibilities out there in the first place, even though most only have a tiny-to-zero percentage chance of occurring. 

In reply to mrphilipoldham:

They use companies like James Maddens Exactaweather and Piers Corbyns outfit. They are cranks.

In reply to Slackboot:

Because it isnt a weather forecast; its a means to sell newspapers to those easily drawn in by big headlines depicting extremes. There was a thread about this (not just the weather but Express headlines in general). See this;

http://expressbingo.org.uk/

Anyone with a real interest in the weather forecast will go nowhere near the express.

In reply to Ian W:

I have just looked at the link. Its so depressing that we look for these kind of headlines. But You cant have good without bad. So I guess its just one end of the spectrum.

In reply to Oceanrower: I do the same , then choose the one that best matches how much I do or don't want to do the activity that requires a forecast .  : xcweather  , yr.no and less reliably the BBC .

In reply to Slackboot:

The express weather column is nonetheless about the most truthful bit of the whole shameful rag.

In reply to Jackspratt:

When we went to Skye this year I found that the best forecasts came from the forecasters that the mountain rescue used. The MRT on Skye tell you who these are on their website. Maybe the Llanberis MRT do the same.

In reply to Slackboot:

I follow quite a few 'amateur' meteorologists for their winter forecasts and more often than not they're quite wrong. It's still fun to read about, and indeed educational. But long range forecasting is reliably unreliable, even the authentic big guns get it wrong most of the time. Such is the nature of the science, we just don't understand it enough. 

In reply to mrphilipoldham:

Its the ' butterfly effect'. Long range forecasts are based on past records...but there are changes in the climate now which means past records dont count as they did.

In reply to Slackboot:

Indeed. Like I said, we don't know enough.

In reply to Jackspratt:

The Met Office...it's really rather good

In reply to Bulls Crack:

I have found that there is a big difference in wind gust strength forecasts between the Met and BBC. Take yesterday, BBC weather saying 60mph gusts in Skye, Met was 49mph. The bridge was closed to high sided vehicles for a while and I think that kicks in at 50mph.

I also think the Met app is shockingly bad.

In reply to Jackspratt:

I swear by Lucy Verasamy. It’s always sunny when Lucy’s on.

In reply to Jackspratt:

I've used netweather to see what is blowing in

https://www.netweather.tv/live-weather/radar

and minutecast on AccuWeather.

AccuWeather now has a future weather radar map (forecast). Not seen that before and something I've wanted for ages.

In reply to Jackspratt:

MWIS. It won’t be any worse than what they say.

In reply to jezb1:

If you only used MWIS you’d get out twice a year at most!

In reply to ianstevens:

Haha! It is always on the pessimistic side!

I tend to use MWIS and yr.no, and it’s usually somewhen in between those two.

In reply to jezb1:

Does seem to be the case! I’ve recently switched to Meteoblue; not because their forecast is any better per-se, but because they have a nice page that shows you all the model outputs on a graph so saves looking a 3/4 sites. Requires a bit of a critical eye for data mind.

In reply to ianstevens:

Can you provide a link to the model output, please? I can't seem to find anything resembling that on the Meteoblue site, but no doubt am looking in the wrong place!

In reply to Jackspratt:

If you want to fully weather geek, then this is a must:

https://www.windy.com/

Their Phone app mirrors this.

In reply to Jon Read:

On the website if you select forecast in the left hand menu you get a drop down with links to the multi model meteograms. Only works per location rather than in space mind.

In reply to ianstevens:

Have you seen wxcharts.eu? It allows you to view charts of lots of different models with lots of different overlays. You can also click on a location and get more graphical displays, although for less models. For the more meteorologically advanced it also displays ensembles and skew-Ts, only in GFS so quite a course model but still handy.

Another handy feature is if you click on the model run time and hit space bar you can jump between model runs to get an idea of consistency.

In reply to Slackboot:

It depends on what exactly you mean by long range, but you're right, most forecasts have some climatological built into them to try and keep the forecast within plausible limits. This helps to filter out the more extreme forecast outputs, but it does have the down side that more extreme outputs are very occasionally right!

Depending what your looking at most medium to long range forecasts will be model driven, but can have some skill applied, such as looking at things called teleconnects, basically global weather that can have an influence on our weather a few weeks down the line. A couple of the more commonly known of these are the Northern Atlantic Oscillation (negative phase gives a higher chance of cold dry weather) and sudden stratospheric warming which can increase the chance of cold easterlies across the UK two or three weeks later.

That said, they still come with large amounts of uncertainty.

In reply to ianstevens:

Got it. Thanks!

https://www.meteoblue.com/en/weather/forecast/multimodel/upper-hulme_united...

love it.

In reply to Le Sapeur:

I'm not sure what you are concerned about here, wind gusts are very chaotic and you could easily see a max gust of 45mph in one location and 60mph in another location less than a mile away, even in flat lands, even more so in hilly areas.