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Did Met Eireann Get Yesterday's forecast Wrong?

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  • 06-02-2009 9:04am
    #1
    dixiefly
    Registered Users Posts: 2,949 ✭✭✭


    I am new to this particular forum.

    The question I am asking is regarding the very poor weather conditions yesterday (Thursday 5th) around Dublin and the East coast. On Wednesday evening I checked www.meteireann.ie an it indicated a good day, albeit cold. I had a particular reason to check as I was planning to attend an outdoor event (which was eventually cancelled due to the weather).

    I dont remember what was actually said on the site but the weather we got was not in any way forecast.


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    #2
    Pangea
    Registered Users Posts: 5,565 ✭✭✭Pangea


    They were wrong on numerous occasions in the past week, chopping and chaning their forecast from 6pm to 9pms, On monday they said no snow for ulster ,but letterkenny got snowed under . also here in donegal they warned of heavy snow on quite a few occasions since then and not once have i seen heavy snow!!


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    #3
    asdasd
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,185 ✭✭✭asdasd


    They dont update enough I think. They send out a script in the AM and people would read "Dry Conditions in Dublin" were a blizzard visible outside the window in the afternoon. For snow events, which are both more disruptive and more volatile than rain events - except for the severest storm - they need to nowcast it.


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    #4
    Mr Benevolent
    Closed Accounts Posts: 12,456 ✭✭✭✭Mr Benevolent


    You have to understand, the forecasting is not an exact science, mainly because of local effects. For instance, snow was forecast for Dublin. I live in the north of the county (near Howth) and work in the south (in Dundrum). Dundrum was snowed out of it on Tuesday and at home we got rain. Local effects such as altitude, proximity to water, hills, ground type... all these thing affect the weather in extremely complex ways. Met Eireann can't predict every effect for every locality, and so the give a general forecast. They predicted some snow, we got it.

    In essence, forecast is a combination of science, commonsense and guesswork, and there's no other way we can do it.


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    #5
    asdasd
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,185 ✭✭✭asdasd


    ok, so get readings from weather stations etc. and say what is happening.

    Quite weird that Howth didnt snow, surely it gets more snow than other parts of Dublin - the hill anyway?


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    #6
    Mr Benevolent
    Closed Accounts Posts: 12,456 ✭✭✭✭Mr Benevolent


    ok, so get readings from weather stations etc. and say what is happening.

    Doesn't work. Dublin Airport is the nearest weather station to my home (4 miles away) and got snow. We didn't.
    Quite weird that Howth didnt snow, surely it gets more snow than other parts of Dublin - the hill anyway?

    Again, local effects. Howth is virtually surrounded by water which tends to keep the DP above 0. Very difficult to predict.


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