From Dr. Benny Peiser at The GWPF
Questions Over Met Office Rain & Drought Predictions
The forecast for average UK rainfall slightly favours drier-than-average conditions for April-May-June as a whole, and also slightly favours April being the driest of the 3 months. With this forecast, the water resources situation in southern, eastern and central England is likely to deteriorate further during the April-May-June period… This forecast is based on information from observations, several numerical models and expert judgement. —Met Office 3-month Outlook, 23 March 2012
Seventeen counties in South West England and the Midlands have moved into official drought status, after two dry winters have left rivers and ground waters depleted. The news comes as the Environment Agency warned that the drought could last beyond Christmas. While rain over the spring and summer will help to water crops and gardens, it is unlikely to improve the underlying drought situation. —Environmental Agency, 16 April 2012
There’s evidence to say we are getting slightly more rain in total, but more importantly it may be falling in more intense bursts” — Julia Slingo, Met Office, 3 January 2013
The frequency of extreme rainfall in the UK may be increasing, according to analysis by the Met Office. Statistics show that days of particularly heavy rainfall have become more common since 1960. The analysis is still preliminary, but the apparent trend mirrors increases in extreme rain seen in other parts of the world. –Roger Harrabin, BBC News, 3 January 2013
In the wake of the “more rain and more intense rain” story, Doug Keenan sends this graph of England & Wales rainfall records for 1766-2012. Let’s just say the trend towards more rainfall is not obvious. As indeed is any trend towards less rainfall, which is said to be more likely by the UK Climate Impacts Programme. –Andrew Montford, Bishop Hill, 5 January 2013
Suddenly, after a wet year, which naturally the Met Office failed to forecast, they have reversed their customary fiery slogans to “Après nous le deluge”. Their antediluvian joy has given way to postdiluvian melancholy. They appear to have difficulty with the concept of random sequences of events, such as the precise positioning of the jet stream, and the fact that they produce apparent patterns and records. It was primitive man’s inability to envisage an effect without human cause that gave rise to much of religion. Of course it would have been most impressive if they had predicted all this a year ago, but they did not. Their predictions are as changeable as the weather and the only constant is the putative cause. –John Brignell, Number Watch, 3 January 2013
The Met Office continues to suffer from its recently acquired pretensions about climate. Careless remarks about BBQ summers and snowless winters and droughts in the UK have all been followed by Mother Nature failing to comply with their wishful thinking – the wishful bit being their hope that their faith in the power of CO2 in the system, or at least in computer models giving it a powerful effect, can be relied upon. –John Shade, Bishop Hill, 5 January 2013
My take on all this is that the alarmists are just getting desperate, spinning any weather and data to suit the CO2 thesis. Remember that the record annual rainfall for England is still less than the average annual rainfall for Scotland, hence if the average track of the jet stream is a little further south than usual then England gets a fair bit more rain. It has nothing to do with the alleged warmer atmosphere having more potential to store H20; if it was why did north-west Scotland have a drought in the spring and early summer? More bollocks from the Met Office. The UK weather and climate is determined by the track of the jet stream (and moderated by the Gulf Stream), and CO2 has feck all to do with it. –Lapogus, Bishop Hill, 5 January 2013
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David L says:
January 5, 2013 at 8:52 am
Let’s play “Spin the Climate Forcast Wheel”.
I seem to remember that MIT USA invented one of those a year or two ago. Was on WUWT.
Ack says:
January 5, 2013 at 9:56 am
Eventually they will get one right, then it will be….we told you so
Wishful thinking on your part or theirs ?? :))
I wonder if they can turn their predictive powers to Premier League football or any other sport where I can bet against them. Daddy needs a new car.
tired of getting angry about it says:
January 5, 2013 at 9:07 am
Unfortunately it is also picked up by the meeja – Tom Clarke the Science Editor of Channel 4 News in the UK has been in a frenzy about the Met Office summary of only ‘the second wettest year ever in the UK’ (ok, since records began, er relatively recently). Outrageous uncorrected porkies, like continuing ‘trend for warmth’ (no statistical warming for 16 years), or ‘predicted by the computer models’ (no graphs showing the IPCC failed predictions vs reality), and attribution, without any evidence whatsoever, of whatever warming there has been to human causes.
———————————-
It is brainwashing on an “unprecedented” scale, and I am getting tired of getting angry about it too – now I just think: don’t worry about the sheep, most of them will never wake up, this is something we just have to live with . Hope for the best (government is kind, our best interests at heart, etc.), prepare for the worst – got coal/oil/wood, water and storable food? Bow and arrows?
This is the future they are planning for us. AGENDA 21. We must pay. for our eco-sins Gia must be free. All hail the UN and the UN FCCC, Rio Summit, Copenhagen…
Aye, right..
/rant
More unrefined bollocks from the Met Office.
My last comment should have added the date: 14 March 2012
As part of the BBC’s coverage of the news that 2012 wasn’t actually the wettest on record, BBC reporters (inc. Harrabin) asked a series of leading questions, first to the CEO of the Eden Project and then to the owner of a fruit farm in Essex in a desperate, failed attempt to get someone to say “Global warming is ruining my business”. Hopefully the new DG will pay some attention to to Nigel Lawson’s open letter, weed the buggers out, and restore some credibility to the Beeb. I’m not holding my breath though…
Does anyone know when the Met. Office started getting a better result than ‘just like yesterday’?
It is amazing how their efficiency has falen since they became a political plaything.
I beleive that a key to their success on D-Day [‘The Longest Day’] was having weather observations from the Western Approaches [marine, submarine, and aviation sources] – in an area that had been systematically purged of any Nazi observers.
Still took meteorologists to interpret it, though!
I remember – probably fifty years ago, with fellow schoolboys, Dixon, Upstill, Nancekievill – doing weather forecasting in class. We were eight – nine, tops. Took the synopsis form the morning paper, and made predictions from that [after about a fifteen minute discussion, during morning ‘playtime’, so about 1030 LT]. Over four weeks – twenty school days – IIRC, we had about eight right. So did the Met. Office – although not completely the same eight. Looking back, I wish we had also noted how many right we would have got it right if we had said ‘just like yesterday’ everyday!
“Grumpy Old Man says:
January 5, 2013 at 8:02 am
Come on chaps, the Met Office is not all bad. They did a spectacular job on June 5th when they predicted stormy conditions in the English Channel would abate for the next 24 hrs as a depression reversed its track and moved S.E. On this basis, Eisenhower launched the D Day landings in Normandy on the following day and the weather proved kind. ”
Don’t give the met office any credit for this please. It was the RAF’s Group Captain Stagg who decided this. He was in charge of a team of armed forces meteorologists with met office as a small part. If it had been left to the met office alone we would all be speaking German now no doubt!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Stagg
The Met and the media are their own worst enemy. The more they collude to promote their alarmist junk science based climate predictions, which never fail to be completely wrong, the more they loose credibility with the public. Eventually the majority view of the public will turn firmly against them and they will loose all ability to influence public opinion.
Kitefreak said
As a UK citizen:
1) They WILL get my (not “their”) taxes anyway
2) No. I don’t like being robbed
3) Yes. It IS normal
4) I cannot see anyway that is legal, honest and decent to change this sorry state (or State)
5) I can’t afford to get too worked up about it – high blood pressure.
One thing that is certain at the MET, leeches do not let go until they’re completely fed.
Who advised Crighton on State of Fear, that was some forecasting? I did a lot of driving over the holidays and listen to it on cd, he had this whole scam laid out fairly accurately, less the dramatic octopus killings. I guess he could have looked at the acid rain or nuclear winter scares for guidance, but he nailed so many themes.
Using the daily rainfall data for England and Wales from the Met Office site
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadukp/data/daily/HadEWP_daily_qc.txt
which runs from 1931, it is possible to calculate the mean intensity of rainfall per rain day in each month.
Looking at the trends from the intensity data the Pearson Product Moment Correlation results are:
Rainfall Intensity
R2 R Slope Intercept
All Monthly 0.0016 0.0399 0.0019 -0.6327
Annual 0.0158 0.1257 0.0016 -0.1166
Jan 0.0002 -0.0123 -0.0006 4.5018
Feb 0.0005 0.0229 0.0011 0.5147
Mar 0.0028 0.0529 0.0022 -1.6761
Apr 0.0073 0.0857 0.0034 -3.9774
May 0.0061 -0.0783 -0.0028 8.3110
Jun 0.0234 0.1528 0.0062 -9.4413
Jul 0.0026 -0.0510 -0.0019 6.7183
Aug 0.0017 -0.0413 -0.0017 6.5224
Sep 0.0005 0.0219 0.0010 1.2868
Oct 0.0067 0.0821 0.0044 -5.0043
Nov 0.0003 -0.0170 -0.0009 5.5105
Dec 0.0427 0.2066 0.0108 -17.8617
None of these are significant at the 1% level.
The number of Rain days shows the following:
R2 R Slope Intercept
All Monthly 0.0013 0.0356 0.0071 9.9350
Annual 0.0122 0.1104 0.0065 11.1480
Jan 0.0003 0.0162 0.0025 21.9127
Feb 0.0086 0.0925 0.0156 -7.4305
Mar 0.0244 0.1561 0.0312 -38.3161
Apr 0.0013 -0.0359 -0.0079 37.3549
May 0.0004 0.0191 0.0037 15.4490
Jun 0.0034 0.0580 0.0114 -0.5451
Jul 0.0068 -0.0826 -0.0153 53.4462
Aug 0.0056 0.0746 0.0162 -7.8853
Sep 0.0148 -0.1218 -0.0237 69.8067
Oct 0.0179 0.1338 0.0270 -28.3507
Nov 0.0238 0.1543 0.0222 -17.3032
Dec 0.0000 -0.0069 -0.0011 28.9716
Again none of these are significant at the 1% level.
Thus while it is true that there is an apparent trend in the amount of rain per rain day over the period, there has been significant variability over the 82 years of record and the conclusion that rainfall is becoming more intense does not seem to be supported.
Clearly data with a finer temporal resolution than a day might show a different picture, but from their own published data the conclusion of greater intensity does not seem to “carry water”.
“Met Office Accused Of Misleading Public Over Rainfall Trends”
I thought ‘New’ was the whole point of ‘News.’ This is a “Dog Bites Man” story. Now if they ever got caught accurately describing the weather trends you’d have a real headline.
Here is a game that can be played from the land of David Suzuki and Andrew Weaver not to far off topic I hope, ” Delta flooding could be a climate change video game”. This game takes place in British Columbia Canada south of Vancouver in a densely populated area called Delta. Now Delta is built on a very low delta of the Fraser River and being at sea level is used as a bell ringer for warmest gnashing of teeth. Anyhow development in this area is not such a great idea, we have heard that story before, sea level rise or not. Pumps and dykes used. CBC is Canada’s version of BBC and ABC. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2013/01/04/bc-climate-change-game.html?cmp=rss
I`m on the Big Island right now. There is a “drought“ on the slopes of Mauna Loa where they produce coffee: 110 inches of rain instead of their `normal` 170 inches. This is the 8th year or so. There has been very little precipitation for years on the tops of the volcanoes, where the top of the clouds are typically about 9000`: they need major storms to produce clouds, let alone rain or snow, above 9000`.
Regional changes in wind patterns, moist air masses and storm tracks are clearly the `problem` for the Big Island. Not changes in the global temperatures.
Like England, the Hawaiian Islands suggest that regional changes are very, very significant to a `changing`climate. Changes that are not being sufficiently considered in the CAGW narrative.
With apologies to all those who are familiar with this old joke, it bears repeating.
It was the late fall and the Indians on a remote reservation in South Dakota asked their new chief if the coming winter was going to be cold or mild. Since he was a chief in a modern society, he had never been taught the old secrets. When he looked at the sky, he couldn’t tell what the winter was going to be like.
Nevertheless, to be on the safe side, he told his tribe that the winter was indeed going to be cold and that the members of the village should collect firewood to be prepared. But, being a practical leader, after several days, he got an idea. He went to the phone booth, called the National Weather Service and asked, ‘Is the coming winter going to be cold?’
‘It looks like this winter is going to be quite cold,’ the meteorologist at the weather service responded. So the chief went back to his people and told them to collect even more firewood in order to be prepared.
A week later, he called the National Weather Service again. ‘Does it still look like it is going to be a very cold winter?’ ‘Yes,’ the man at National Weather Service again replied, ‘it’s going to be a very cold winter.’ The chief again went back to his people and ordered them to collect every scrap of firewood they could find.
Two weeks later, the chief called the National Weather Service again. ‘Are you absolutely sure that the winter is going to be very cold?’ ‘Absolutely,’ the man replied. ‘It’s looking more and more like it is going to be one of the coldest winters we’ve ever seen.’
‘How can you be so sure?’ the chief asked. The weatherman replied, ‘The Indians are collecting a lot of firewood.’
Oy, give us Brits some credit for wit! Let’s have the graph of historical rainfall shown on the BH pages as well, it’s a corker!
Twittered Harrabin about the flip flop from drought expected to continue into 2013 and now more rain and heavier!!! and apparently it changed in the 1960s??? still awaiting a reply!LOL
The Victorian Floods in Windsor
1869, 1872, 1875, 1877, 1891 and 1894,
There’s evidence to say we are getting slightly more rain in total, but more importantly it may be falling in more intense bursts” — Julia Slingo
http://www.thamesweb.co.uk/windsor/windsorhistory/floods1875.html
The volcanic eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 led to an unprecedented drop in land precipitation and runoff, and to widespread drought, as precipitation shifted from land to oceans and evaporation faltered
http://www.int-res.com/abstracts/cr/v47/n1-2/p123-138/
It is likely that measured rainfall has become intense, caused by decreased urban aerosols and the urban bias of the surface stations.
Aerosols cause more persistent non-precipitating clouds near their source decreasing rainfall.
BTW, the quote above is from a Trenbeth paper, where he states increased atmospheric temperatures (from GHGs) cause more intense precipitation, then cites the Pinatubo eruption as evidence. When volcanic eruptions cause cooling and the decreased precipitation is an aerosol effect.
A classic example of poor logic and science, even by the low standards of climate science.
I went to the GPWF website and clicked a link to the Met Office
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadukp/data/download.html
I found this gem of science and statistical logic in explaining their historical precipitation data.
“Please note, the last 6 months’ values are subject to change as a result of quality control. Also please note that we have re-calculated all daily and monthly UKP values from January 2006 to date using a more representative selection of stations, to counter the effect of various station closures over the past several years and to take advantage of some new stations which are now available. We have taken steps to ensure that this will not have affected the homogeneity of the series. This re-calculation was performed in May 2011.
Full details of this re-calculation, including lists of stations used, are included within Climate Memorandum no. 29, available on request if you contact us.”
Aren’t the phrases “quality control” “representative selection of stations” and “homogeneity” the ones we heard in regard to Met, IPCC, and CRU “quality controlling” historical temperature data?
Simply, if the new data doesn’t conform to our models we will “homogenize” it and force it into the pattern we know is correct. We will permit no lumps in our beautiful creamy theories.
Without wishing to appear sexist. Has anyone even noticed how disproportionate the number of female alarmists is?
DaveE.
AndrewMharding @ur momisugly 7:48 am
I feel your pain my friend. BUT I do like to be fair to the Met Office (as difficult as that is these days). You see their warnings on the TV etc. but large parts (perhaps as high as 75%) of the snow/ice warning to gritters and snow ploughs is done by private companies – they are cheaper.