Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years • Hacker News Board

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#51

Post by Al-Khwarizmi » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 9:20 PM UTC

tedajax wrote: post #4

rikkus wrote: post #3

I half-jokingly tell people that if they get their forecast from the BBC (via the Met), they should expect the inverse weather. I wonder if the BBC has checked the quality of the forecasts based on what actually happens? I use AccuWeather and the Aix Weather Widget (for Android) because they're nearly always right (where I live, at least) - and gives me much more useful information. For example, I can't translate the…

I actually learned that the rain percentage is not the percentage chance that it will rain but is in fact the percentage of the coverage area that they will expect to get rain. So 50% rain meaning no rain at all or rain for the whole day is entirely reasonable.

I've always interpreted it as the percentage of time it will rain, i.e. if it says 50% chance from 7 to 8, it will rain during about 30 minutes of that interval and not rain during the other 30 minutes.

(equivalently, you could say it's the % chance that it will be raining if you choose a given instant X in the interval).

I've never read an official interpretation but that seems to fit reality (where I live) quite well.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#52

Post by proactivesvcs » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 9:34 PM UTC

simonswords82 wrote: post #27

I'm a techie and I've been using the Met Office service more recently as part of obtaining my private pilots license. Before I get to their ability to forecast correctly I need to say that their tech appears disorganised to say the least. Check out this garbage: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/aviation/ga . Specifically the text under General Aviation services. They attempted to release a new version of the General Aviat…

This is a fab site to use in conjunction with predictions, as it provides an animated radar rainfall map of the past few hours: http://www.raintoday.co.uk/

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#53

Post by rockinghigh » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 9:39 PM UTC

tedajax wrote: post #4

rikkus wrote: post #3

I half-jokingly tell people that if they get their forecast from the BBC (via the Met), they should expect the inverse weather. I wonder if the BBC has checked the quality of the forecasts based on what actually happens? I use AccuWeather and the Aix Weather Widget (for Android) because they're nearly always right (where I live, at least) - and gives me much more useful information. For example, I can't translate the…

I actually learned that the rain percentage is not the percentage chance that it will rain but is in fact the percentage of the coverage area that they will expect to get rain. So 50% rain meaning no rain at all or rain for the whole day is entirely reasonable.

Yes, it's the probability of rain.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#54

Post by vacri » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 9:44 PM UTC

binarymax wrote: post #8

I've lived in the UK for the past 8 years now (having lived in various places in the East Coast USA for the rest of my life). I learned quickly that English weather forecasts are useless past the current day. It is probably due to the geographical location. East Coast US was accurate to 3 to 5 days. I just use Dark Sky[0] to get weather for the next several hours, which is mostly accurate. Given the situation with th…

My old boss was a South African expat who had also lived in the UK for a little while. Her comment on the two weather services: In the UK, they'll predict it will rain tomorrow at 3pm for 15 minutes, and it does. Whereas in Capetown, you can actually physically see the storm approaching over the sea, and they'll still be forecasting fine weather...

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#55

Post by dtf » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 9:50 PM UTC

Not sure if available worldwide, but there was a very interesting Radio 4 program recently, "What's the Point of The Met Office?", asking all sorts of awkward questions of this venerable institution.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06418l5

Of particular interest is the Met Office's constant demand for bigger more expensive computers, and its recent moves into the more politically contentious territory of climate change policy.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#56

Post by bitlevel » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 10:05 PM UTC

sago wrote: post #50

I couldn't find anywhere that said the BBC were dropping the Met Office. Is this FUD / standard media hype? From what I gathered the BBC has decided to put forecasting out to tender. To which, the Met Office is very welcome to bid. It may end up meaning that the Met Office is gone, but not necessarily. So while the Guardian headline is strictly true, some bits of the report make it sound like it is a done deal.

This may be of help - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34031785

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#57

Post by ilikerashers » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 10:21 PM UTC

rikkus wrote: post #3

I half-jokingly tell people that if they get their forecast from the BBC (via the Met), they should expect the inverse weather. I wonder if the BBC has checked the quality of the forecasts based on what actually happens? I use AccuWeather and the Aix Weather Widget (for Android) because they're nearly always right (where I live, at least) - and gives me much more useful information. For example, I can't translate the…

I've found the opposite. Android/Yahoo/Google weather are generally telling me the wrong thing. I've come to rely BBC weather.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#58

Post by alecdbrooks » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 10:46 PM UTC

dtf wrote: post #55

Not sure if available worldwide, but there was a very interesting Radio 4 program recently, "What's the Point of The Met Office?", asking all sorts of awkward questions of this venerable institution. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06418l5 Of particular interest is the Met Office's constant demand for bigger more expensive computers, and its recent moves into the more politically contentious territory of climate cha…

>Of particular interest is the Met Office's constant demand for bigger more expensive computers, and its recent moves into the more politically contentious territory of climate change policy.

It doesn't seem that interesting to me. One of the reasons supercomputers are built in the first place is for studying weather and climate [0]. And "politically contentious" or not, climatology is a reasonable thing for a meteorological office to study. For example, the National Weather Service in the United States does both.

Also, the Met Office has been involved in climate research [1] for a long time, so it's hardly "recent."

[0]: For example: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/08/0829_050829_...

[1]: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate-change/resources/hadleyc...

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#59

Post by dtf » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 10:52 PM UTC

alecdbrooks wrote: post #58

dtf wrote: post #55

Not sure if available worldwide, but there was a very interesting Radio 4 program recently, "What's the Point of The Met Office?", asking all sorts of awkward questions of this venerable institution. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06418l5 Of particular interest is the Met Office's constant demand for bigger more expensive computers, and its recent moves into the more politically contentious territory of climate cha…

>Of particular interest is the Met Office's constant demand for bigger more expensive computers, and its recent moves into the more politically contentious territory of climate change policy. It doesn't seem that interesting to me. One of the reasons supercomputers are built in the first place is for studying weather and climate [0]. And "politically contentious" or not, climatology is a reasonable thing for a meteor…

I take it you didn't listen to the programme.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#60

Post by alecdbrooks » Sun, Aug 23, 2015, 11:09 PM UTC

dtf wrote: post #59

alecdbrooks wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Of particular interest is the Met Office's constant demand for bigger more expensive computers, and its recent moves into the more politically contentious territory of climate change policy. It doesn't seem that interesting to me. One of the reasons supercomputers are built in the first place is for studying weather and climate [0]. And "politically contentious" or not, climatology is a reasonable thing for a meteor…

I take it you didn't listen to the programme.

No. What is it about how the Met Office studies climate change and requests new computers that is interesting? They both seem self-explanatory, so it didn't seem like listening to a 28-minute program would be worthwhile.