The Modern Met Office's Performance

[Coast]

The last couple of very windy days has prompted discussion on the current performance of the Met Office.

Please constructively discuss your views here without getting into a slanging match or being defamatory to the Met Office or any other weather organisation.

I'm sure praise and 'big ups' are also welcome!

[leicsnow]

Quite concerning is my verdict. There is all this news about the destruction the storm is causing and the only warnings the Met have in place for today is icy patches in Scotland?

Edited January 5, 2012 by Tellow

[Insert Name Here]

OK Ill kick this off..and I will preface this by saying that I have complained to the METO. (lifted from other thread)

Why is discussing the performance of the Met Office considered off topic? Forgive me if I am speaking from a position of inexperience on the forum but is this not a weather thread about January Atlantic storms?

I for one think its perfectly relevant. As I said in a previous post, the METO have a responsibility to us as public servants and are one of the very few UK public servants employed in direct connection to the UK weather. Their successfulness or otherwise in providing the UK with appropriate warnings as they are paid to do, seems of paramount relevance to any discussion regarding these storms and most especially on a forum where there is an extremely high percentage of amateur weather forecasters/enthusiasts.

The warnings of the METO are more than just badges that some people get miffed about when they dont get issued with one.

They are used as benchmarks by many agencies, Public and Private, to establish the necessary level of preparedness in terms of business continuity and more importantly public safety and as such, MUST be accurate and timely.

I accept that the science is not exact and applaud them when they do get it right but what I cannot find any excuse for is when they fail to issue warnings for weather that is actually happening on the ground there and then.

That is not forecasting, does not require any specific meteorological skill or training and should be expected as a basic starting point for their service to the public. All it requires is the ability to look at the news, read the weather station actuals and perhaps make a phone call or two.

The reluctance to criticise in this respect by some here seems bordering on the bizarre at times. Are there many here who are ex Met or have Met friends or other vested interests?

As public servants they must accept public criticism of their performance and why shouldn't that be discussed here? Feel free to correct me if I am wrong.

[cyclonic happiness]

OK Ill kick this off..and I will preface this by saying that I have complained to the METO. (lifted from other thread)

Why is discussing the performance of the Met Office considered off topic? Forgive me if I am speaking from a position of inexperience on the forum but is this not a weather thread about January Atlantic storms?

I for one think its perfectly relevant. As I said in a previous post, the METO have a responsibility to us as public servants and are one of the very few UK public servants employed in direct connection to the UK weather. Their successfulness or otherwise in providing the UK with appropriate warnings as they are paid to do, seems of paramount relevance to any discussion regarding these storms and most especially on a forum where there is an extremely high percentage of amateur weather forecasters/enthusiasts.

The warnings of the METO are more than just badges that some people get miffed about when they dont get issued with one.

They are used as benchmarks by many agencies, Public and Private, to establish the necessary level of preparedness in terms of business continuity and more importantly public safety and as such, MUST be accurate and timely.

I accept that the science is not exact and applaud them when they do get it right but what I cannot find any excuse for is when they fail to issue warnings for weather that is actually happening on the ground there and then.

That is not forecasting, does not require any specific meteorological skill or training and should be expected as a basic starting point for their service to the public. All it requires is the ability to look at the news, read the weather station actuals and perhaps make a phone call or two.

The reluctance to criticise in this respect by some here seems bordering on the bizarre at times. Are there many here who are ex Met or have Met friends or other vested interests?

As public servants they must accept public criticism of their performance and why shouldn't that be discussed here? Feel free to correct me if I am wrong.

I'm agreed.

There simply doesn't seem to be any correlation between what's happening on the ground and the relevant warnings (if any at all).

And it seems to have got worse in the last couple of years.

There should have been an amber warning across most of England,Scotland and Wales for last night and a large portion of today and instead, even though the winds were blowing upto severe gale force until a couple of hours ago, there weren't any???

And some of the folk on here seem to think that acceptable.....?

[Aaron]

I was under an amber warning once, for wind, in 2011, but it came to nothing - yet we get 77mph gusts causing power outages and falling trees, and we only get a yellow warning.. I understand the folk at the Met are smart and know what they are doing but that was not on at all.. it warranted a much more severe warning, for sure, because it really was ferocious.

[Jimmyh]

i have just had a look and that is the most pathetic cone ever across north scotland and a stretch of england

[Coast]

Things you may not know about the Met O regarding their performance:

How accurate are our forecasts? Did you know that:

• our four day forecast is as accurate as our one day forecast was 30 years ago;
  
• 80% of our next day max temperature forecasts are correct to within 2 degrees;
  
• the Met Office is consistently one of the top two operational weather forecasting services in the world.
  

http://www.metoffice...us/who/accuracy

In-depth case studies of high profile severe weather events that have affected the UK in the last few years. The actions the Met O took to help services ensure public safety:

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/who/how/case-studies

Also, for commercial users:

http://www.metoffice.../data/assessing

[Raidan]

Wish i knew the title of that youtube vid where Andrew Neil interviews the head of the metO,Like i said in a different thread i gave up on the metO years ago but that vid basically sums up the metO,for me anyway.

[La Bise]

But if the MetOffice start issuing warnings left, right and center, people will start to complain about "health and safety gone mad" and "nanny state"...

[A Winter's Tale]

I think their snow warnings have been awful this winter:

Two distruptive snowfalls in the NW of the UK only got a yellow warning or nothing at all.

Manywet snowfalls for the Scottish Hills and other pointless ones got amber warnings.

I just don't get it!

[La Bise]

On a more serious note, I do rely heavily on the MetOffice to ensure my hobby is as safe as possible, them alongside MWIS provide me with important information and are, more often than not, on the money.

[Aaron]

But if the MetOffice start issuing warnings left, right and center, people will start to complain about "health and safety gone mad" and "nanny state"...

If they start issuing warnings for 10mph gusts then yes, but 91mph gusts (in Sheffield this morning) warrant a severe warning of at least amber

Other then the warning of last night I don't have much to complain about - they usually do okay for our area, sometimes the temperatures are way out, especially at night, though

Edited January 5, 2012 by Aaron

[Insert Name Here]

Wish i knew the title of that youtube vid where Andrew Neil interviews the head of the metO,Like i said in a different thread i gave up on the metO years ago but that vid basically sums up the metO,for me anyway.

This one ? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/the_daily_politics/8443687.stm

[UV-RAY]

I have to agree with those who say the MetO have been rather woeful with regards to issuing weather warnings. On the flip side of that, I think there LRF have improved greatly over the last twelve or so months.

[Raidan]

Nice one INH thats the one

[Snowangel-MK]

.. I understand the folk at the Met are smart and know what they are doing.....

...of course they are smart and know what they are doing

[Insert Name Here]

From what I can read out there on the net there seems to be a general feeling that the focus of our once internationally renowned Met Office seems to have become somewhat diluted when their mandate was split and the climate change agenda fell into their remit as well as the core function of UK weather forecasting.

Whilst it is patently obvious to anybody over 40 that our climate is changing the question of whether or not it is anthropomorphic (man made) remains to be proven. This is a subject which is probably best avoided in this discussion.

I for one am still on the fence on that one however the fact that it raises billions upon billions in taxes is beyond question.

If it were the case that Westminster had exerted some influence on Exeter in placing too many of their resources in the tax lucrative area of AGW at the expense of traditional UK weather forecasting it would be unfortunate to say the least however that too will have to remain on the unproven list.

Either way their mandate seems to have become diluted. All they would need, to have been able to make their warnings accurate and timely in respect of the here and now would be a team of people keeping an eye on the real time data from all sources. This team needn't necessarily be highly trained.

That to me is their most basic function and I cannot think of any mitigation that they could come up with to explain their obvious failure to meet that benchmark over the past couple of days.

[johnholmes]

...of course they are smart and know what they are doing

that reminds me of a Giles cartoon when I was forecasting. He very kindly sent me a copy of the original.

It hangs on the wall behind me.

[kev238]

For me, they have been spot on with regards to forecasts in the medium (6-15) and long (16-30 day) forecasts. Their short forecasts are also good.

The issue I have is with the inconsistency of their warnings on their website and the fact that they dont seem able to respond to an event in real time issuing red warnings for Scotland two hours after the real battering started on the West Coast.

Also, not having warnings for many areas last night which took a real battering; East Anglia, West Midlands, North West Midlands, North West England were not even covered by a yellow warning for winds.

Yet look at the impacts the weather had on the news today and you see that this was a severe event overnight for England; perhaps the worst wind for some of these areas in 4 or more years.

Also, large areas of England were removed from warnings for Tuesday's storm on the Monday after being asked to be aware for a few days. This almost suggests there is nothing to concern with regards to wind. The results were all over the news on the day of the storm including damage across the whole country.

I know they have changed their warnings system several times over past few years but this new system still seems to suffer from the same inconsistencies as past warning systems.

[A.J]

A rather poor show last night/today from the met office IMO especially as warnings weren't put up and/or upgraded for weather events happening in real time, but on the whole, I find the met office forecasts to be generally very accurate and give good 'heads up' for potential severe weather, it seems to me that sometimes some folk just want to blame somebody or some organization for bad weather, in our nation that organization being the Met Office of course, but the last time I looked, the met office had a mandate to forecast weather, not control it!

Never the less though, by not reacting (either at all or quick enough) to real time events the past 24 hours, the Met Office had laid themselves open to all manner of criticism regardless of whether said criticism is justifiable or not

[Liam J]

While I have the respect for the Met Office and find their forecasts pretty accurate, I'm afraid that the last few days unfortunately for the Met have been abysmal regarding the warnings. I'm sure they will analyse all the data collected from the last 24-48hrs and a full review and investigation into the handling of the situation will be launched.

Gusts over 80mph were recorded in parts of Cumbria even inland with 70mph being widespread. Only a warning for rain was in place with a brief mention of strong winds included! Keswick over 2 hourly obvservations recorded 68mph and 78mph gusts, many more could have occurred at these levels in between the obvs being taken.

The gust of 78mph recorded at Keswick is actually the highest for 7 years and higher than the speed reached in this location during the epic January 2005 storm that hit Cumbria. During this storm Cumbria had been issued what was then an emergency warning by the Meto the highest level, this would now be the red alert warning category.

The police were warning motorists to be extra careful on Cumbria's roads this morning after reports of trees, branches and other debris all over the place. My drive to work was interesting this morning!

[Zenarcher]

I find the Met Office forecasts accurate and don't have a problem with them but its their weather warnings I do think they need to improve on. For example in early December a violent storm hit my area bringing gusts over 95mph causing damage and the police even closed roads yet all we had was a amber warning. On this week Tuesday the same thing happened over 100mph gusts recorded over Southern Scotland and a red alert was issued to late when winds were already hitting these areas. When I saw that low move in stronger and deeper than forecast I knew Southern Scotland would get badly hit with high gusts an hour before surely the Met Office who have access to much more data saw this as well an hour before but didn't put a red warning out until an hour later.

[Chris K]

For my area, i feel they have done well in their forecasts and have generally been close to the mark. Im only approaching 22 so cant comment on what they were like before they 'modernised' if i can describe it that way.

However, i feel the new warning system is over complicated with all these funky shapes being drawn trying to cover specific areas. The seperate rain,fog,ice and wind warnings i think should stay somewhat, but change it back to cover the general UK areas. Then in their descriptions, cover aspects such as any local variables which could possibly enhance effects such as wind speeds etc (high/exposed ground, wind funnelling prone areas etc) to give a better idea to people what travelling through certain areas may be like.

I was a bit bemused as to why the warnings didnt change from those yellow alerts yesterday, and also would ask whether there is a team looking at various different live data sources (im sure there are), and keep warnings relevant to weather system developments as they move across the country. Local radios often provide ample information and update listeners of problems occuring during severe weather, and this info is often provided by weather services such as the met office and people out on the roads etc.

As others have said, im sure these past few days will be reviewed by them, and hopefully improvements made. Thats not to say all of us shouldnt use our initiative and check other forecasts, tune into radio etc. I always check more than one source for weather info, but yes i also agree our public national weather service should be on the ball, especially with severe weather.

I think a moderated forum on the met office site for each regional area should be created in some form like there is here (i dont think they currently have one?). I think it would be a good way for staff there to read of weather situations developing live by peoples posts. Problem is i guess theyd get a tonne of hate posts.

Sorry for the essay, just thought id put across my opinion

[on the coast]

A rather poor show last night/today from the met office IMO especially as warnings weren't put up and/or upgraded for weather events happening in real time, but on the whole, I find the met office forecasts to be generally very accurate and give good 'heads up' for potential severe weather, it seems to me that sometimes some folk just want to blame somebody or some organization for bad weather, in our nation that organization being the Met Office of course, but the last time I looked, the met office had a mandate to forecast weather, not control it!

Never the less though, by not reacting (either at all or quick enough) to real time events the past 24 hours, the Met Office had laid themselves open to all manner of criticism regardless of whether said criticism is justifiable or not

Suppose they are in a no win situation really, however i feel last night was very poorly forecasted for this region regarding their warning system.

[J10]

I have always had a great respect for the Met Office and nothing has changed that view. Indeed their updated website is fantastic IMO.

Onto the specific topic of weather warnings, this is a difficult one, is it better to overdo or underdo warnings. With the new system of yellow and amber warnings, it is possible to have a general warning out in advance of potential severe weather, and then fine tuning it to amber as the weather suits. IMO there should have a been at least a yellow warning out for wind yesterday.

The new weather warning system now appears to be standardized across Europe and maybe ever further afield.