The Met Office is to stop publishing seasonal forecasts, after it came in for criticism for failing to predict extreme weather.
It was berated for not foreseeing that the UK would suffer this cold winter or the last three wet summers in its seasonal forecasts.
The forecasts, four times a year, will be replaced by monthly predictions.
The Met Office said it decided to change its forecasting approach after carrying out customer research.
Explaining its decision, the Met Office released a statement which said: “By their nature, forecasts become less accurate the further out we look.
Tricky forecasts
“Although we can identify general patterns of weather, the science does not exist to allow an exact forecast beyond five days, or to absolutely promise a certain type of weather.
“As a result, ‘seasonal forecasts’ cannot be as precise as our short-term forecasts.”
It said the UK is one of the hardest places to provide forecasts for due to its “size and location”, making it “very hard to forecast much beyond a week”.
However, it said its short-term forecasts are “extremely accurate”.
The Met Office, based at Exeter in Devon, added that it would work towards developing the science of long range forecasting.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/8551416.stm
=============================================
I see this more as an insurance policy than one of admission of lack of skill. Though they are right, beyond about a week, entropy and chaos kicks in. About all anyonecan forecast seasonally with accuracy is:
Spring will be warmer than winter
Summer will be warmer than spring
Fall will be cooler than summer
Winter will be colder than fall
We’ll so how well they do with short-term monthly forecasts that are “extremely accurate”.
h/t to WUWT reader Robert of Ottawa
Anthony, thanks for the amazing variety of posts and your wry humor. I had noticed that some comments about typos were getting “picky” or “pedantic” instead of helpful (reference to last post). I had always assumed that those who noticed “errors” were simply being helpful so you did not have to hire an editor as you sped your way not only to producing the best science blog but a blog of amazing quality — always presenting another perspective, always educating. The commenter-crew you have developed over the years is spectacular. Where is there any better collaboration?
Get some rest — you deserve it. Your son is very fortunate. Tomorrow is another day.
When Corbyn forecast the Cumbria UK floods from 100 days out, that got my attention. As I’ve dug into his work a little more & then a little more as I’ve had time, it has become clearer & clearer that he knows things the mainstream has COMPLETELY missed.
Some UK supermarkets use a NZ weather forecasting business so that they can co-ordinate seasonal produce purchase and merchandising; the BBC have allegedly been looking at the same business to do their public forecasting.
The fact that a NZ computer graphics business did the BBC TV visuals is almost a secret as the Met office seems willing to take the credit for something that works! The visuals on TVNZ weather reports are far superior to the UK version, however, in that the ‘flyover’ is incredibly realistic, similar to a high-altitude flight simulator.
During WWII, the Axis forces struggled with weather forecasting as the Allies had a more global and thus more successful picture of evolving weather conditions.
I, too, have bee singularly unimpressed with the met office’s forecasts and my basic peasant logic tells me that if they can’t forcast weeks ahead, no way can they even pretend to do longer range stuff. If their models have a consistent margin of error as the seasonal works, the arrival of another ice age would be predicted as warming.
Paul Vaughan (15:31:07) :
When Corbyn forecast the Cumbria UK floods from 100 days out, that got my attention. As I’ve dug into his work a little more & then a little more as I’ve had time, it has become clearer & clearer that he knows things the mainstream has COMPLETELY missed.
My reply;
I think Corbyn still has some to learn about the lunar declinational periodic repeating patterns utility, he could add more detail out further from the analog data base it generates.
I have attempted to contact him and got a nice “thank you we will pass this on note” but I suspect he is busy with the processing of how to respond to the alarmists BS. as the higher priority, as it should be, if he wants copies of my process, and codes He can have them, if he bothers to ask.
“Charlie (08:41:55) :
As a farmer, I am regularly astonished at how bad the much vaunted 5-day forcasts are – but I’ve never got round to analysing them.
For February, however, I printed off the 5-day forecast for Winchester every night (starting the project on 28th Jan) , and also the ‘observations’ data for that day. When i get round to it, i’m going to compile a little record of just how bad they were! And they were awful.”
Spot on, Charlie. I wish I had done that too. I have watched/checked the 5 day forecast and confidently discussed the forecast with friends (as we weather obsessed Brits do), only to discover THE SAME DAY that the whole forecast has changed. Having booked my outdoor tennis lesson on the basis of the forecast predicting clear weather, we then find it’s rained off. Bloody useless.
And as for that BBQ summer last year and the completely stupid decision I made to stay at home and enjoy the warmth and the sun……………Never again. Well, I can’t now anyway. What a rubbish service and what a complete waste of taxpayers money – and this lot reckon they can forecast AGW. Huh!
On that note, I’m going to bed. I’m supposed to be waking up to cloudy skies tomorrow and bright sunshine on Sunday. We’ll see – I’m planning to do some gardening…………..
Two announcements in the MSM from the UK Meteorological Office, both incorrect and neither having anything to do with meteorology, just the sort of thing that makes you proud to be British?
This is quite odd, my Farmers Almanac has been right about everything this winter. How is it some hayseeds are so much better than some oxbridge edjumicated perfesshunals?
mikelorrey (17:08:36) :
Maybe because the academics set standards of education practices by the results of the winners of political infighting between schools and departments.
What gets pushed as true is the viewpoint of the winners, by the time they have been haggling for the past 100 years the truth has been lost somewhere.
Where up poor old hay seeds keep what works, and add more things that work as we find them.
Re: Richard Holle (15:52:40)
Richard, thanks for the note. I’ve been following your notes at tallbloke’s [ http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/ ].
Piers Corbyn is a pretty busy guy. He’s not sitting on a fat, guaranteed, tenured university golden-handshake – and he faces fire on several fronts — all of that on top of wrapping his mind around complexity where all before him have failed.
I encourage you to condense your most-key insights into a single page. That may sound like a tall order, but I think this is very important. Maybe think of it as developing bait to attract more curiosity. One strategy is to leave your audience hungry for more …so they will ask for more. (Establish value and create desire.)
Please let me know when you have something potent & succinct — I’ll keep an eye for a note at tallbloke’s – (I might miss it here due to the volume).
Cold Englishman (14:16:00) :
There is a story, possibly apocryphal, about a UK weather observer during WW2.
This observer was stationed in a remote location in far western Ireland and acquired a considerable reputation for being able to accurately forecast the expected weather for the UK over the next couple of days.
A couple of weather experts were sent out to the remote location to check on his methods.
Simple he said!
When it gets near sunset I go out onto the high promontory over there and if I can see the sun setting in the far west I know that the next day or two will be fine here and over England.
If it is bad visibility and cloudy and I can’t see the sunset at all and it is looking rainy out to the west, I know that the weather will be poor to bad here and over the mainland for the next couple of days.
Picture of Piers Corbyn rolling around the floor laughing comes to mind!
Now, Met Office people, can you also stop Louis Gray spouting your AGW nonsense in the UK papers? Oh by the way, can we please have our money back that you have wasted on your bad predictions? Oh and by the way, can we have the original raw data and the codes? Oh and by the way…..enough for ou to be going on with for now!
Anthony, hope you are recovering and nuts to the sphelling police ;=)
oops above should have been you not ou, before someone jumps on me!
Well that is no fun.
The Met Office can no longer forecast the weather one season ahead. However their forcasts for a century and half a century ahead is still “robust”.
Their logic – it is easier to forcast a century ahead than just one season, which arrives too quickly and can quickly be be verified.
Another example often given, we cannot tell if a particular day will be warm or cold, rainy or dry, but we can forecast the seasons very well, winter will be colder than summer.
They have verified this by means of their complicated GCM’s and supercomputers, without which we would never have known.
“Alexander (15:52:38) :
The fact that a NZ computer graphics business did the BBC TV visuals is almost a secret as the Met office seems willing to take the credit for something that works! The visuals on TVNZ weather reports are far superior to the UK version, however, in that the ‘flyover’ is incredibly realistic, similar to a high-altitude flight simulator.”
I believe these sorts of visuals were derived from technology with I think was originally developed in NZ for the America’s Cup yacht race called Virtual Spectator.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2832934a-27f6-11df-9598-00144feabdc0.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/scotland/4579829/Scottish-ski-industry-could-disappear-due-to-global-warming-warns-Met-Office.html
Julia Slingo, head of the Met Office, giving evidence recently to the Government Inquiry into the leaked CRU e-mails, stated that the nature of weather was – in her word – ‘chaotic’.
Which kinda makes you wonder if ANY computer modelling can possibly indicate what the climate will be like in 20, 30, 50 years time..!
A side issue which NO-ONE has brought up. Between 1947 and 1962, the USA, the Soviets and others (the UK and France to name but two) let off literally HUNDREDS of massive nuclear devices more or less for the fun of it – alright, to test them of course – but with no concern whatsoever about the effect on the atmosphere.
Unless I’m mistaken, there basically wasn’t any measurable effect.
However – these days if you’ve got an SUV you’re personally reducing the planet to a crisp.
Comments, anyone..?
And another thing (to pinch the title of one of Jeremy Clarkson’s books)….
Artic sea ice – firmly predicted to be disappearing as fast as in a g&t.
The daily-updated graph on the right – produced without drama or comment by JAXA – shows that the 2010 trace is EXACTLY in the middle of the spread for the last nine years (or, as the alarmists would have it, ‘since records began’).
Its a bugger isn’t it, when the facts don’t accord with the predictions..?
So our energy companies in UK rely on these Met office predictions. I mean pay for them? And then winter in UK is, as now, NOT Scorchio. Suddenly such companies need to pay big market bucks at the last minute for gas supplies because reserve is inadequate (add panic phrases). Does China need a large dump of super computer scrap? Probably NOT!
Patrick Davis/Alexander – sorry, guys – but I have been lobbying the Met Office (obviously with nil effect) since the ‘flyover’ was introduced on the UK weather map in 2005, because I makes me feel nauseous. I have to look away until they’ve stopped it to do the regional forecasts. You know – the super-accurate ones…
Purely from predicting the solar signal, my score for weekly temperature departures from normals through 2009 was 49/52. The same weekly departures from normals could be seen to be occurring in Australia as well as most North Hemisphere locations. The warmer periods were; mid March, most of April, the last week of May, June 21st for 3 weeks, most of August, the last week in September, the last week in October, the middle 2 weeks of November (which I missed, but have found the cause since), and a week around Christmas.
I do wish the Met Office the best of luck in this strange new world of “customers,” weather prediction, taxpayers, and in its seeming attempt to provide some kind of service. Don’t expect to much of yourself at first.
Zeke the Sneak
A number of people have mentioned that the new “review” cited by the Met Office should be in the public domain, and I quite agree. At the moment it is only easily accessible from academic facilities.
The key part of it of course is the list of references. I have got hold of a copy and pasted the referenced papers into a document you can download here:
http://www.mindfunk.net/temp/stott_paper_refs.rtf
I’m unsure of the legalities involved here so will not share the full “review” – I think providing the list of references is fair use however.
I am currently going through the “review”. That’s in quotation marks because the entire document is a 20 page puff piece, four pages of which are the list of references.