weathercam Posted March 17, 2004 Report Posted March 17, 2004 Time for your small kites - This Friday and going into the weekend - things are looking promising ---> http://www.seaspritesports.com/ukobs4.htm and weather warning from the Met Office Here is an ADVANCE WARNING of Severe Gales affecting Scotland, Northern Ireland, England and Wales. Issued by the Met Office at 08:55 on Wednesday, 17 March 2004. This is the first warning of disruption due to Severe Gales between 06:00 on Friday 19 March 2004 and 09:00 on Sunday 21 March 2004. The Met Office is forecasting two depressions to cross the United Kingdom later in the week, the first most likely during the day on Friday, and the second probably during the second half of Saturday into Saturday night. Both low pressure systems have the potential to develop into major storms, with attendant damaging winds that could give gusts in excess of 70mph inland, which would lead to structural damage and cause disruption to transport. At this stage there is considerable uncertainty in the track and the intensity of both systems, though on balance the southern half of the UK is more at risk. For enquiries regarding this warning - please contact your regional Met Office. Transmitted by the Met Office at 08:55 on Wednesday 17 March As ever things may change - but at the moment looking good. Check out actual weather / wind / archives / tides etc for Geriatrica on Sea region at the link below )Brighton through to Littlehampton & Hayling areas) Regards WC ----------------- Regards WeatherCam http://www.seaspritesports.com/weatherframe.htm Quote
bladebrother6 Posted March 17, 2004 Report Posted March 17, 2004 Best site i've found to check the weather before you leave for the beach. No forcasts but accurate present weather for a lot of stations. http://www.xcweather.co.uk/ Quote
weathercam Posted March 17, 2004 Author Report Posted March 17, 2004 here we go again - xc weather sources its data from the various airports in the NOAA Metar system plus gathers other info from the offshore buoys, then collates the info and provides a very user friendly interface to view the data - the only trouble is that it can often be two hours plus out - and as many of the locations are airports, they tend to be somewhat less exposed than open beaches - so as in the case of Shoreham, you'll often find the airport reporting about 6 - 8 mph less than what local weather stations are reporting - and if you then combine that with the vagaries of a sea breeze day - xc will hardly ever report those acurately - or by the time they do and you see it, it will have dropped... Yes it's a good site and you can see weather fronts and various activity, but I certainly would not use it as an accurate up to the minute weather site! Regards WC Quote
GaRRy Posted March 17, 2004 Report Posted March 17, 2004 Yes it's a good site and you can see weather fronts and various activity, but I certainly would not use it as an accurate up to the minute weather site! Regards WC In my experience no such thing I just plan to go away and live with consequenses. Some time you loose but more often than not you gain (Its very rare the weather is as bad as forecast all day). Plus there usually good company and a bar if it really is bad. Quote
weathercam Posted March 17, 2004 Author Report Posted March 17, 2004 Garry Me thinks I've got a "few" more years experience on you in this......at the end of the day I moved from being an inlander to living right on the beach - it's the only way to be sure to maximise your time out on the water - bearing in mind first and foremost I'm a "polesurfer"... Plus for my sins about three years ago I ran the now defunct Boatastic Weather Stations operations that comprised 22 video weather stations at key sailing locations around the UK - updating every 20 mins - then you could see the weather systems tracking up the channel - through the course of the front. IE no wind in Folkestone / Worthing and Hayling - but further on down at Plymouth and Weymouth it was blowing and at Poole it was just starting to - so combine that with a forecast and you had a good idea that wind was on the way - if on the other hand there was no wind at Plymouth - it more often than not meant it would be a good day to get the Brownie Points!! Regards WC Quote
GaRRy Posted March 17, 2004 Report Posted March 17, 2004 Actually you have just proved my point. What im talking about is people not bothering to go away for the weekend based on regional forecasts what you are talking about is virtual real time and also over a specifc area. As im sure you are aware weather is far more localised than that and hence most forecasts are the average over quite a large area. Quote
weathercam Posted March 18, 2004 Author Report Posted March 18, 2004 First and original point I made when responding to the xcweather comment was that you need up todate conditions - and then if you have any nounce, you combine those readings with a forecast - however in the sea breeze season which we tend to enjoy much better thermal accelerated breezes here on the South Coast then say Hunstanton etc or West Kirby - it's even more important... "so as in the case of Shoreham, you'll often find the airport reporting about 6 - 8 mph less than what local weather stations are reporting - and if you then combine that with the vagaries of a sea breeze day - xc will hardly ever report those acurately - or by the time they do and you see it, it will have dropped..." But then living in Tamworth I suppose you're an expert on travelling down to the coast and sitting in a car / bar I do other things when there's no wind! king.module 1 Quote
Tone Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 Personally i would always watch what Weathercam says, as in my experience, he or she is very accurate. when ever i have seen a forcast or warning by weathercam, it has been spot on. i.e last year weathercam said about a situation that was going to happen on the south coast, where a 20knot side on shore turned into a 30 knot off shore squal.... personally, when weathercam says something. i listen. tony Quote
carlos_climber Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 Same here..... And Tone it's getting warmer....it's about time we saw you on the beach again. Quote
Tone Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 yes! it is indeed! when you next going to the coast?! and is there space for a small one? *me board* Quote
carlos_climber Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 should be going early on sunday as I have to get back...big winds...so I may be out on something small...you're alway welcome to use any of my other kites if the titan is a bit big Woody broke...building another for the weekend...a tad smaller Quote
Tone Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 how did it break!? i hope it was from landing hard from 40ft with the psycho !!! and not just packed bad in the car! Tony Quote
GaRRy Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 But then living in Tamworth I suppose you're an expert on travelling down to the coast and sitting in a car / bar I do other things when there's no wind! LOL Yea well if I was lucky enough to live right on the coast and just drop everything at a moment notice I guess I would be interested in the what a local wind meter says (mind you just looking out window at trees gives me a pretty good idea if I want to just go up local field. Guess were making different points. Most of us have to travel and make arrangements for such and what im saying is making those arrangemenats based on 2/3 day or more forecasts is counter productive as they are far to generalised and may even be wildly inaccurate over a small area. Many a time ive spent a great day at Hoylake when a) the forecast has been **** and b) as far as i can tell afterwards everywhere else near by it has been. Of course I have had the opposite as well Quote
darrengray Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 carlos saw you on sat at shoreham before and after the broken board you swam sum way out to get the other half back but i suppose its worth it to get the strap and fins off i was on the airush lift pros and flying my mates slingshot fuel for a bit and trying to get him going this weekend is going to be blowin a hooly but i hope to be over on my 7m rebel pro if its not too gusty and howling im lucky i only work a 4 day week so i should be on water tmoz with any luck wind permitting but severe gale 9 beein forcast for shoreham at weekend with winds of up to 75mph Quote
8015 Posted March 18, 2004 Report Posted March 18, 2004 But then living in Tamworth I suppose you're an expert on travelling down to the coast and sitting in a car / bar Close, GaRRy normally sits in a buggy on the (sand) bar during the daytime! On the subject of weather forecasting I can't really disagree with either you, the detail you get on the telly and most web sites is rubbish, but that's not to say that you can't make some well educated forecasts if you have access to data at the right resolution or know how to interpret synoptic charts and track them over time. Scotland is an awful place for weather forecasting, every mountain and glen creates it's own weather system, the islands and tides can play all sorts of havoc around around the coast as well, but if I'm sea kayaking and we check the shipping and inshore waters forecasts and note the movements of fronts and highs and lows we can get a pretty good idea if we need to get up early and try and outrun a weather system or if we should just plan on spending a day stormbound I'm not a weather expert, I'm just someone who is always frustrated by the damn stuff! I now have sports for when it's really wet (whether windy or otherwise), when it's windy and dry or only a bit wet, and when it's dry and calm - but can I ever decide from the forecasts which one I should do - can I hell! Take this weekend - possibilty of a severe weather system heading in, possibly breaking up into 2 big storms. Precipitation forecasts for the west are too much for flying but not convincingly enough to go kayaking. The East might be perfect on Sunday, but coming up to spring tides I fancy playing on a west coast tide race, but I reckon it works best on easterlies and so far the forecasts I've looked at are predicting all wind directions on the same day! It's exactly the wrong weather for biking in however it turns out! Strong winds often seem to bring the weather in ahead of schedule and sometimes the weather will blow itself out before it was due to build up, other times it just gets worse than expected. It would be so useful to have enough realtime weather stations around the country to be able to keep proper tabs on the weather and make more informed judgements! I have to agree with GaRRy though, it's often worth just heading out to see how the weather develops. 2 years ago we were sea kayaking off Skye, and had been stormbound (well too much for some of us, actually not too bad) on Rona for a couple of days. We knew more bad weather was due but that a lull was going to proceed it. The plan was to set off and keep pulling in at potential campsites and checking the weather and how we felt with a couple of potential escape routes leaving us a shorter paddle either back to broadford or somewhere we could hitch back for the cars. In the end we had glorious calm settled sunny, even warm weather right through the day and the bad weather only hit us in the early evening, by which time we had progressed from Rona the full length of Raasay and were only a couple of miles from the cars - so put our waterproofs on and made a dash for it finishing at dusk having just done 2 days worth of paddling based on the suck it and see approach. JIM Quote
weathercam Posted March 19, 2004 Author Report Posted March 19, 2004 Aaah now blowing good F6 - and forecast for storm force 10 later - though hopefully we won't get that as I'm worried as to the new (precarious) position of my anenometer on the chimney!!! North Forland to Selsey Bill South to southwest 5 or 6 increasing gale 8 to perhaps storm 10, then veering west to southwest 5 or 6, but occasionally 7 later Looks like it will last well into the weekend. For up to the minute actual wind speeds / archives and loads more weather info for the South Coast see http://www.seaspritesports.com/weatherframe.htm Regards WC Quote
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