Met Forcasting
 

Is it me or is the standard of TAF's produced by the Met Office getting less and less accurate.

e.g. a main group indicating 9999 and 1500' cloud base with temp groups of 3000 mtrs and 500' cloud base

When what actually happens is 1000 mtrs and 200' cloud base for 12 hours or more.

This seems a little odd or am I missing something?

Tafs
 

I dont know what your chatting about I find them accurate and very imformative!!

I agree that the TEMPO lasting all day is a bit strange; perhaps the main group and temp group should have been reversed. I am sure they do their best and they do get it right on occasions.

Tafs
 

NVG do u actually fly? If so do you know what met is??

Jibb

What do you think?

What would you say is the definition of TEMP ?

Badly I imagine

Do you know me?
Do you know what I fly?
Do you know my history?

Judge lest ye be judged

NVG
 

1. yes
2. EC135
3. yes

I think the answers you were looking for are:

NO
AS355
NO

NVG
 

I think not more like an R22!!!

Whats the weather like on your planet anyway?

Girls. . . TEMP means for a period less than 2 hrs.

.............Must've been a really slow day at GW yesterday!!! :)

From "World Meteorological Association - Manual on Codes"

"TEMPO shall indicate frequent or infrequent temporary fluctuations to forecast meteorological conditions which are expected to last less than one hour in each instance and, in the aggregate, cover less than half the period indicated "

That is the definition....

Farsouth,

Correct definition, I wonder why the Met Office don't know this! Since they have moved to the South West corner of the UK the forecasts have definately taken a turn for the worst.

Is it me or are the TAF's now written so broadly that when the Met Office come to compile their stats, they look better than they actually are?:(

As a secondary question, why is it that they don't include a forecast temperature in the TAF. Would be quite useful I would have thought.

In some parts of the world (South America, Central America, maybe elsewhere) they often do include forecast temperature,
example would be

TX16/18Z TN05/06Z

Meaning forecast max temperature +16 deg C at 18Z, forecast minimum +5 deg C at 06Z.

Todays TAF.
 

TAF YPAD 281544Z 1818 06008KT CAVOK
FM23 30010KT 9999 LIGHT SHOWERS OF RAIN BKN140
FM10 05010KT 9999 LIGHT SHOWERS OF RAIN BKN140
T 22 24 30 32 Q 1011 1012 1013 1011

In Oz the TAF has a validity of 12 hours, reissued every 6.

Therefore the Temps and QNH's shown are at 3 hourly intervals.

Other information sources
 

In western europe I consider this a very necessary complement to TAF's.
It is systematically very reliable for planning several days in advance (GFS up to 10 days)

http://www.wetterzentrale.de/topkarten/fsavneur.html