View Full Version : Wind Direction
Does anyone know how we came to describe the wind direction from whence it comes instead of where it is going?
It's something like the fact that aircraft rudders are all operated in the wrong sense and we pilots have all had to learn to use them the wrong way round!
kiwi chick
25th Sep 2007, 01:33
Hahaha! I'm going to sound like a nutter, but I've always wondered that about the wind too! Would be far easier to think "it's a northly, that means I'll get blown to the North..."
Anyone else agree?!!
Lemper
25th Sep 2007, 07:20
I guess it is the same reason that, in airline aviation, four stripes are used for the pilot in command, that the PIC is called "captain", the co-pilot "first officer", that the control surface acting on yaw is called "rudder" etc....
On a sailing ship (or boat) it is more important to know from where the wind is coming than where it goes as the optimum sail position and sailing depends on that wind origin; besides, the wind origin is measurable, but who knows where it is going after it has passed your vessel?
A Very Civil Pilot
25th Sep 2007, 18:04
As winds brought things to you, I suppose it made sense to name wind directions as to their origin i.e the Cold North Wind, Sou'westerly storms - 'It's cold in the North, thats where the wind is coming from, and now it's cold here, so we'll call it a northerly wind.' It doesn't quite ring with, 'it's cold in the north, now it's cold here, but the wind is heading off to the south so we'll call it a southerly wind.' I think this probably predates aviation by several thousand years!
reynoldsno1
25th Sep 2007, 21:05
But at 41S, it's the Cold South Wind that doth blow....