3 Weeks in and the eagle/met have been more accurate than the Boards "experts"

pistolpetes11

gihj wrote: »

No no no no no.
Read the title of the post please.
Are you deliberately trying to make an issue of an intended fun thread????
Lets start from a level playing field and compare the 2 so.
My contributions to any particular thread are none of your business thank you very much.
You know NOTHING about me or my ability/sparetime or internet access

I am discussing the topic at hand ,

I have already given my comparison on the "2"

The thread is not "fun" its derogatory and insulting to the "Boards experts" who have given a lot of time and effort to informing people and keeping them up to date on the weather.

snow ghost

gihj,

One thing for certain is that the people here are more accurate at highlighting and especially giving prior notice of potential weather developments and events than met eireann.

I read about the potential for large scale snowfall for Sunday on these boards before met eireann gave any indication.

That's what makes it interesting... watching how things will pan out... and what Mother nature will decide to do in the end... It's a bit like the grand national with weather fronts... doesn't really matter who if anyone here calls it wrong.

gihj

You are talking nonsense now kid.
Have i spent more time on here or met.ie in the last 3 weeks??
Stupid question to a stupid answer.
I have huge respect for the regulars here and take offence to you making a childish attempt to garner support to what you have developed into a ridiculous argument by including these good folk in it.
I have no more time to discuss this subject with a "petty child" now so on your bike pal.
MT,DE,WC etc i look forward to you lot "defending your wild weather forecast accusations v the Eagle on here":rolleyes:
Thanks for the good work guys

kopp

WolfeIRE wrote: »

The person who started a thread gives us their opinion 'Discuss.....................................'.



Thanks for you op. Here is mine.

Boards.ie have been forecasting. ME have been nowcasting and even then getting it arseways on occasion. 6cm in west today was their prediction up until one hour ago?

I would gladly listen to boards.ie forecasts rather than 'stick hand out the window' nowcasts anyday!'

Once again thanks for your excellent post at the beginning.

I agree with Wolf. Boards.ie all the way.

gihj

Sure ghost,me too.
And i hope the guys get it right too.
Like i said they call it earlier and that takes balls.
Here's hoping:D

pistolpetes11

gihj wrote: »

You are talking nonsense now kid.
Have i spent more time on here or met.ie in the last 3 weeks??
Stupid question to a stupid answer.
I have huge respect for the regulars here and take offence to you making a childish attempt to garner support to what you have developed into a ridiculous argument by including these good folk in it.
I have no more time to discuss this subject with a "petty child" now so on your bike pal.
MT,DE,WC etc i look forward to you lot "defending your wild weather forecast accusations v the Eagle on here":rolleyes:
Thanks for the good work guys

Calling me a child and then you start with the name calling

This is a silly inflammatory thread and should be locked or deleted .

gihj

I fully trust and support the mods and their decisions pete.
However,you cant get it locked just because it goes against your opinion.
Now THAT IS childish:o

gihj

Back ot guys,
At this stage the met don't agree with our expectations for sun/mon.
I have a funny feeling sky were on to something as early as yesterday afternoon:eek:

pistolpetes11

gihj wrote: »

I fully trust and support the mods and their decisions pete.
However,you cant get it locked just because it goes against your opinion.
Now THAT IS childish:o

I give up with you, Think i will go out and stick my head in all the lovely snow thats outside.

Good evening to you Sir.

M.T. Cranium

Naturally I read this thread, it only promised three pages so I had some chance of getting through it.

Some perspective on two things, just as my contribution to the discussion.

They are unrelated things. First, why boards.ie has a forecast thread at all. Back around the end of May, I started it up really with the intention of providing a place for discussions like the ones we've had all winter, but the June weather patterns generally failed to excite the imagination so it turned into a daily forecast from me, not because I figure myself to be some guru on Irish weather, but because nobody else was up at 0400 to look at the model runs. So it's one of those accidental developments, fuelled by the rather unexpected response to the thread (it began to show over 200 views per day, while our weather forum at that time especially had a core group of twenty or thirty people).

Therefore, since people kept spontaneously suggesting that we keep going, and a few of "the lads" were ready to step in for some holiday periods, the boards.ie forecast thread seems to be here to stay, even if a petition were to be signed by a hundred disaffected individuals saying "MTC forecasts are crap" I've already been sweet-talked into continuing by an equal number who seem to hold a different view. And as several here have aptly pointed out, this is more or less an enthusiast forum, so it seems churlish to ask people to stop having fun. I do approach the forecasts with a sort of professional dedication, realizing from numerous comments and PMs that quite a few people count on them for more than personal entertainment or amusement.

I could point back to several instances where the combination of the forecast thread and other forum members' input have given people a good warning of something about to happen, in particular, the nasty freezing rain event on Christmas Day. But my approach is not a competitive one, for one thing not living in Ireland, I don't see all these personages and gurus on TV so I have no idea except from reading boards.ie what they think of coming weather situations, and I only have met.ie's website (which I think is quite good in fact) to rely on for the "official" version of the forecast. I check it but sometimes I am "going to press" before their morning update, so I get to see it after the fact. My impression has been (somewhat different from the topic at hand here) that we often come up with about the same forecast, but I have more space to pad mine out with details if I feel the urge, something that I assume the TV presenters do as well.

Anyway, that's one point, the other has to do with forecast accuracy constraints and I would use this forthcoming snow possibility on Sunday as my example. You can discuss a 72h forecast to death but the problem with the discussion is, you're discussing model depictions that are bound to change closer to the event, so that your forecast has to be either a blind leap of faith that one model has things exactly right (and you can interpret it exactly right), or, a subjective blend of all the guidance, your own gut feeling and whatever you bring to the table. Comparing the outcome to each person's 72h assessment of something like this is dangerous in one case, but if you go through this for say a hundred different events, you'll probably get a sense of who is more reliable and who is less reliable as your guide, and also get some sense of "bias" which is the tendency of an individual to go higher or lower on various elements.

But in this Sunday snowfall case, all that a reasonable forecast can convey is a range of uncertainty at this point, there are marginal elements that may change closer to the time, so trying to "nail" a forecast like this at a three-day time range (it will be two days if I keep typing) is what we call "swinging for the fences" in North American weather jargon (a baseball term meaning you either "hit it out of the park" or you get to sit down.)

That's my input. But I would say that in all these winter threads that we've had going on, there has been plenty of useful insight and forecasting from quite a few people, and I've learned things too from reading them. The idea that somewhere, there exists a particular guru, organization, company, institute, furriner, whatever, who will always be right -- is wrong. That much I am sure of, but people have their individual styles and ranges, with forecasting it is always "caveat emptor" which is more or less how I came to be Emptor Cranium.

gihj

Thanks MT,
I know i speak for everyone on here when i say yes you most certainly are a "guru".
Keep up the dedicated good work my friend:)