weather decoding
 

We decode the metar/TAF wx informaiton everyday, one day I ask myself, why . .1)MI stands for "shallow" not SA?SL?SO?SW? . .2)BC stands for patch?. .3)BR stands for mist?. .any clues for that?. . . . <small>[ 17 March 2002, 00:39: Message edited by: hu ]</small>

BR is from french Brumé meaning haze. .BC I think is banks. .MI is mince if that might be another word for shallow I´m not sure..

BR is actually Mist, HZ is haze

Mince = Frensh word for 'Thin' (MI). .Brume = '' '' '' 'Mist' (BR). .And one more frog term.... grele, meaninig literally 'hail' (GR)

BR - Bruillard (French) - fog or mist;. .MI - Mince (French) - thin or slim;. .BC - my memory fails........... .. .I always laugh when hearing foreign pilots and ATCOs speaking, upholding the view that their own language should be used for RTF exchanges and operational paperwork, and yet having no words in their own tongues for 'transponder', 'autothrottle', 'Flight Management Computer' etc, all of which are invariably spoken in american english!!

Yes,. .. .BC is Bancs. .. .I wish I'd known most Met terms had French connections. If only my instructors had mentioned this before I did all those Met courses years ago.

and of course, the classic... .. .mayday=m'aidez

Pan Pan - en panne (Fr) - breakdown

Thanks all you guys, that was a great big help.. .I also notice there is one little mistake on my question BR=mist not haze.

The french touch to your guess. .. .MI stands for "Mince", thin in english. .BC is "Banc", stands for patches. .BR is "Brume" stands for mist. .. .MI is normally associated with FG, Fog, as is BC. .. .Hope it helps. .. .Northern sky, I am sorry to inform you that you are wrong on the national glossaries. .. .Transponder is called transpondeur in french, and is not a "frenchisation" of any english word. .. .Autothrottle equivalent is Automanette. .. .HSI will be called "plateau de route". .. .Few years ago, one of the culture minister wanted french to use only french words in official documentation, He had to "invent" some new words where translation was impossible ! That was funny.. .. .I concede that a lot of english/american terms are used in aviation (like FMC & FMS) but I think it deals more with the fact that a lot of french pilots are doing Type Rating overseas.. . . . <small>[ 18 March 2002, 16:40: Message edited by: PorcoRosso ]</small>