Weathermen To Be Sacked
by Ian R Thorpe
2010-01-19
CREATIVE COMMONS: Attribute, non commercial, no derivs.
KEYWORDS: weather, forecast, science, scientists, masthematics, mathematical, computer, satire humour, humor
It is not before time that we report the imminent sacking of the BBC's weathermen. The Met Office which has been providing the corporation's weather reports for 90 years is falling apart if it's recent track record is anything to go by. Were Met Office a football manager they would have been sacked long ago, even a civil servant with such an abysmal record would be struggling to say in their job.
Met Office managers claim the problem is that their long range forecasts have not been very accurate (the Barbecue Summer they promised was "odds - on" back in June 2009 anyone? The warmest winter on record they forecast for the winter of 2009 / 2010?) Not very accurate is gross understatement.
"Long range forecasting is a science that is in it's infancy" a Met Office spokesman explained. In it's infancy or an aborted foetus. Long range weather forecasts have been around for three decades and are no more accurate now than they were then. Like all sciences, weather forecasting works best when things are predictable. Forecasting weather three months ahead for the Sahara desert is not a problem. Same goes for the South Pole. The embuggerance of weather for casting is that in places where people live (sand dunes and ice floes have little use for weather reports no matter how accurate) the world tends to be inconsiderately unscientific.
The problem goes deeper than that however. Met office short range for casts, what will it be like outside in two days or tomorrow for example have been wildly wrong in recent years. Only last week we had a forecast that a mighty winter storm was brewing and the whole of Britain would be lashed with gale force winds as we shivered in freezing temperatures. In the event it was very cold and very very still, hardly a breath of wind blew. Good job the government has not got very far with its plan to get most of our electricity from windmills. Wind power might be good for Climate Change profiteers and Labour's new best buddies Tata International but as a nation we would have frozen.
That's the thing about wind power you see, very often the coldest weather comes with very still conditions.
Forget wind for a moment, let's just think about basic common sense. After the great wind storm had arrived as a catspaw there were rumours that more heavy snowfalls were on the way.
"Oh, no they aren't said the Beeb, a few slight flurries maybe but nothing serious." Even as that forecast was being read out the first flakes were descending of a snowfall that would blanket much of the nation in up to eight inches of fresh snow on top of the packed, frozen stuff that was already causing disruption. When somebody mentioned that the Met Office had predicted a mild, wet winter Mr Spokesman was ready again.
"The current spell of bad weather is just a blip," he said, "it will still be the warmest winter on record. About the same time European weather watching agencies warned that as soon as the snow melted another cold snap would move in from the continental landmass. It hasn't arrived as yet but the temperature this afternoon is noticeably lower than it was yesterday.
Part of the problem is that weather forecasters are the kind of people who spend too much time hunched over their computers or tinkering with their mathematical modelling software to actually get out and about experiencing the real world. One might suspect these people are so detached from reality they could step outside the door into a torrential downpour, return a moment pissed wet through and report that as the computer had predicted it was a brilliantly sunny day outside.
There is a new and dangerous sub species of the human race evolving it seems. So far unnamed these unfortunate creatures are so besotted with science and technology they refuse to believe their computers and mathematical models can be wrong. To hear them rant and rail at any mention of faith or religion you would think they were uber-rationalists but their faith in science is such that when reminded of the weather computers' failure to predict the hot summers of 2005 & 6 and the summer floods of 2007 & 8 as well as this cold winter, or their promise of a Barbecue Summer for 2009 when in fact the summer was cold and wet or their failure to predict storms that caused flash floods, snowfalls that brought the nation to a standstill or any other significant weather events their stock response is as always with their breed, "You don't understand science."
Maybe not but we understand floodwater ruining our homes, we understand holidays spoiled by rain and we understand that farmers who watch the behaviour of birds, animals and insects and old geezers with pine cones and seaweed seem to be able to predict weather quite accurately.
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