WEATHER

Click for a Synopsis of Sources for Tide Forecasts, Inshore Waters Forecast, Shipping Forecast, Surf Forecast, Synoptic charts and MSI Broadcast Schedules - all the detail you need sourced from one location.

Ideas, suggestions or broken links? Please email me with details.


Background / Understanding the forecasts

Anemometers - see the Equipment page.

Beaufort Scale - summary with Beaufort Scale / knots / mph / conditions.

Meteorology - excellent introduction from UKDivers.net.

Satellite images from the Dundee Satellite Receiving Station.

Understanding the Shipping Forecast & Inshore Waters Forecasts - explanation of the format and terms used in the Forecasts.

Understanding Synoptic Charts - how to read those squiggly lines - from The Great Outdoors.

Understanding Wind (part 1) /Understanding Wind (part 2) - highly informative .PDF Factsheets from Cailean MacLeod explaining the effect of wind on sea paddling.

Weather - article on understanding weather from the BBC, with background on how the weather works. The Met Office also has a comprehensive set of Factsheets.

 

General Weather Forecasts

BBC Weather - as good as any.

See the Trip Planning Synopsis for a variety of weather information sources and forecasts.

 

Met Office sites

Click to Listen to the current forecast on BBC Radio 4 - (requires sound and an appropriate player)

Inshore waters forecast

Shipping forecast

Main UK Met Office site

Observations & trends are shown here.

 

Sailing Clubs & other "Yachtie" type sites

Banff Sailing Club also has some nice direct links to general weather sites and proper Bracknel synoptic charts for 24, 48, 72 and 96 hours at http://www.btinternet.com/~banffsailingclub/weather_links.htm

Online Weather's Sailing Forecast

Southampton Water - Bramblenet has local data. As does Chichester Bar.

Yachting & Boating World brings Weather, Tides and Synoptic charts all together here - charts are a bit small, but useful none the less - they have a useful "24 hour history" wind graph linked from the Forecast Data pop-ups.

 

Synoptic charts & Technical weather sites

Airport information and weather www.tmdg.co.uk/weather/ - Current windspeed and dir (METAR) and 18 hour forecast (TAF) at UK airfields. You need to enter the 4 letter airfield identifier from this site: www.nws.noaa.gov/tg/siteloc.shtml

European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting has lots and lots and lots of techy stuff http://www.ecmwf.int/

Scotlandonline.com - UK 3-5 day inshore outlook from the met office for free!

Synoptic Charts - present, 24 hours, 48 hours, 72 hours

Westwind has lots of lovely technical stuff, if you understand it!

Wetterzentrale is a nice German technical site, in German! But http://www.wetterzentrale.de/pics/bracka.html will give you a proper synoptic chart for Europe!

 

 

Surf & Wave Prediction Data Sources

A1 Surf - viewer friendly surf site with wave data, forecasts and summaries for all the major surf spots in the UK.

Channel Coastal Observatory provides some wave, tide and meteorological data. Good wave data for eastern channel - seems to have wave bouys that the
big site doesn't

magicseaweed.com - brings you detailed surf forecasts, surf reports, surf webcams, wave buoys, surfing photos and more surfing information all updated every six hours from the latest available data.

National Data Bouy Centre - the original data source for most of the previous sites, this takes you straight to the raw info!

NOAA weather buoys See what's coming, wind speed, direction, air temp, dew point, air pressure and trend, wave height, period and sea temp.

Wavenet, DEFRA's "Strategic Wave Monitoring Network for England and Wales" - lots of good stuff on waves, including bouy data for England & Wales.

 

 

(Updated 17-Dec-2015 )