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The home page of the Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center gives numerous links to their charts worldwide. Downloads are a bit slow because of all the colour involved If time is not a consideration then this is a useful site. Click on Global Models, then select an area and a menu will appear. This lets you select a type of chart and a time up to 6 days ahead. Sailors will find the charts labelled Sea Level Pressure and Wave Watch Sig Wave Heights to be the most useful. Significant Wave Heights over the Atlantic for each 12 hour up to 6 days ahead are available in one rather slow download. Perhaps, considering the wealth of information it is not so slow because you get all 6 days at one go. If you only want the next two days, just use the STOP button! NOTE - The USA gives wave height in feet. UK and DWD charts will use metres DWD (German Met Service) ChartsThe Georg Met Best site (University of Karlsruhe) has links to these charts, originating from Offenbach and broadcast by radio facsimile from Quickborn/Pinneberg. They are a useful alternative to the UK Met Office for charts covering the North Atlantic and Europe. Shortcuts are in this table.
There
are several good sources for these charts such as the Georg Met Best site
and the Institute of
Global Environment and Science site. For a comprehensive
set of charts including wind/sea and isobars try the NOAA
RadioFax site. There are links also to many other NOAA
services of particular use to anyone crossing the Atlantic.
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| 500hPa,Surface | Analysis | 12hr | 24hr | 36hr | 48hr | 60hr | 72hr | 96hr | 120hr | 144hr | 3-Day Panel |
European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF)
ECMWF charts from Bari in Italy
ECMWF products direct from the Centre
These are very fast to download and are very clear to readNOTE 1
This gives you a choice of area and chart. North Atlantic, surface chart is the default. By clicking onto "Advanced" you can access a facility to loop through these charts off line at various speeds. This is a very useful way to look at the expected changes in the weather patterns.
NOTE 2
ECMWF is a research organisation funded by European Met Services and is charged with developing forecasts out to 10 days or more ahead. They run their computer model once a day only at about midnight but using data from observations made at midday. Charts are available by late morning and are already well into the forecast period. That is why the first chart broadcast is for T=72 hours (really T=48 by the time that it is available.
It
is useful to compare the output for T+120 and T+144 hours
with charts for the corresponding time from UK Met Office
and other centres. If they look broadly similar, then it
gives some indication that the forecasts are on the right
line. If they differ greatly then in suggests that the weather
is in an indeterminate mood.
Forecasts beyond 6 days
Go to the MRF charts on Georg Mueller's site. Against the Sub Head 500 hPa. Bodendr, click onto the period that you want eg 240 hours = 10 days or, quicker, onto 9-panel film. The quality of the longer period charts is not terribly high and it should be noted that ECMWF, UK Met Office and the German Met service do not issue any charts beyond 144 hours ie 6 days ahead. Anything beyond 4 or 5 days really is entering the realm of scientific speculation at this stage. Caveat emptor - except that the charts are free on the Net!Return
to Section
index.
Section VI
Mediterranean Sites
The Météo France Marine site has links to forecasts for Cotes, Large and Grande Large. These are texts of the Inshore waters forecasts broadcast on VHF and the open sea forecasts from NAVTEX and INMARSAT-C. Or, go to the GMDSS page where there are also links to le guide marine giving details of schedules, channels and frequencies for all the French Marine forecasts.The
Spanish
National Meteorological Institute site give links
to texts of forecasts for Sea Areas and forecasts for Coastal
Waters. On this site there are details of Spanish broadcasts,
channels, areas covered etc.
The Catalan Meteorological
Service Site click on Informatió Matitima for
a variety of products - texts, graphics of wind and waves.
Try Forecasts around Sardinia --- Click on Meteo then Previsioni, choose Vento or Mare.
In the Eastern Med try Poseidon for wind and swell forecasts around Greece for 36 hours ahead. The Turkish Met Service gives a 7 day land area forecast, a 3 day land area wind forecast and a 24 hour marine forecast.
DWD and associated sites
There is a very useful Radio Teleprinter Broadcast that gives output direct from the German NWP model. The output is in the form of spot forecasts of wind and sea state for up to 5 days ahead. Forecasts for the Mediterranean for the first day and a half at 6 hour intervals can be found on a Deutscher Wetterdienst site and are very quick to download even over a mobile phone link. The online version. is particularly useful around the Balearics where there is a grid point near each of the three main Islands.
Texts of the 5 day wind and sea state forecasts at 12 hour intervals might be available at the RAMMET99 site (NOTE - these RAMMET99 pages are expected to be activated during the sailing season.)
An
alternative is the Wetter Online site. Click on Sailing,
then Mediterranean. This then gives forecasts
based on DWD NWP grid point output for up to 6 days
ahead. The information is in a graphical form
of wind vectors on a small chart area and is rather slow
to download if using a mobile. One disadvantage is
that the data are not retained in cache so cannot be recovered
later. To save by right clicking on the
chartlet could become expensive with a mobile.
The Wetter Online site is useful on a landline. On a yacht
it is probably better to have a HF/SSB radio and the necessary
software for RTTY which, of course, is a free source
of forecasts. See the Mediterranean Weather
Forecast page for an example.
Return
to Section
index.
Section VII
Miscellaneous Charts and Imagery
Charts
(mean sea level) for oceanic areas. Courtesy
NWS via Karlsruhe University
site
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Satellite Images
Dundee:
Satellite Imagery.
NOTE - it is worth registering; there are no charges but
they like to know who accesses the site.
Return
to Section
index.
Section VIII
Actual Weather Reports
Reports from Ships, Data Buoys and Light Vessels around the UK and Worldwide
For reports from moored weather buoys tryUK Waters Light Vessel and Weather Buoy Reports
or
Worldwide Light Vessel and Weather Buoy Reports
These links give observations from marine automatic weather stations. These can only be of those elements capable of instrumental measurement eg pressure, wind, wave/swell. On the Light Vessels there are also visibility meters. Reports are available frequently, typically every hour.
For more complete observations, try
Observations - Map Search to access all marine observations in a geographical area anywhere in the world. Although this site is run by the US National Data Buoy Center, it does include observations from ships and other marine observations.
Slightly curiously to our European eyes, the US data centre converts the pressures into inches of mercury and temperatures into degrees Fahrenheit as "English" units. This is the default.. Choose metric units for the more usual hectoPascals/millibars and degrees Celsius.
* NOTE - Ships usually only report the weather at the main hours of 00, 06, 12, 18 UTC. When using this site, therefore, choose a time shown as "t-2" or "t-3" etc to define one of these main hours.
Return
to Section
index.
Section IX
Forecasts in Text
The actual and forecast charts from the various sites all originate from National Met Services. For forecasts in text form I always prefer to use the same sources even though there is sometimes a cost involved. This is because I know the levels of staff training, the computer technology used and the organisations.Text Forecasts from UK Met Office
Some of the products available from UK Met Office are given above. Many more can be found from the Met Office Home pageNAVTEX and INMARSAT SafetyNETTM
Forecasts on NAVTEX and INMARSAT SafetyNETTM. are GMDSS services readily available and broadcast at published schedules. The MCA ia actively encouraging all sailors to install the necessary equipment. There are various problems with NAVTEX, one of which is that reception in harbours can be difficult due to interference etc. In such cases it might be useful to use the GMDSS page . These give the texts provided by National Weather Services . The same or very similar texts are used in conventional broadcasts, such as the Radio 4 Shipping Forecast, the Météo France forecasts broadcast by CROSS, RFI and Monaco.Private Met Services
There are a number of sites run by private weather companies
where free forecasts are available. I have always hesitated
to give links to such services because I do not know to
what extent these forecasts are based on the National Met
Service output. Neither do I know the levels of experience
and training of the staff. The presentation of forecasts
by the private companies, eg Météo Consult in France, are
often very good.
Wherever
they come from all forecasts from private companies should
be used with the same care as those from the National Met
Services.
Other National Weather Services
Texts of Météo France, the Spanish and Irish Met Services
can be found at my GMDSS
page.
The Catalan Meteorological Service Site also has some text forecasts.
Return
to Section
index.
Section X
Miscellaneous sites of interest
- World Meteorological Organisation This give links to National Weather Services and other organisations worldwide.
- BBC Weather Centre
- Climatic Research Unit, University of East Anglia, Norwich, Norfolk
- European Centre For Medium-Range Weather Forecasts
- Meteorological Office, UK Met Office, Berkshire
- Royal Meteorological Society, Reading, Berkshire
- le Guide Marine de Météo France for the online version of the Guide
- NWS products available via INMARSAT SafetyNETTM and other links to useful information.
- A comprehensive on-line NWS guide to marine products on the Internet.
- Model output and other Prognoses a comprehensive links to computer forecasts, or products based on them, originating from major centres in Meteorology .
- The UK Weather Information Site Links to UK weather data, past, present and forecasts.
- The
uk.sci.weather FAQ What it says. - an unexciting site
but one that gives many answers to weather FAQs in a no
frills, no nonsense manner.
I have seen and heard of many other sites but have often found them either too general and all embracing or, simply, not user friendly. There are bound to be many more sites that can be useful to sailors. When or if I hear of sites that look genuinely useful I will try to update this page.
Addendum
Charging for weather forecasts is not confined to the UK. In France, for example, there are various services available from Météo France by telephone and Minitel or from Météo Consult, many at prices similar to those in the UK. Usually, some information is freely available as broadcasts by Coast Guards and MRCCs. Free information on many Web sites is either paid for by advertisers or is there as a "loss leader". In this world, there is no such thing as a free dinner!
Under the SOLAS convention certain weather information is available free of charge at the point of delivery. The minimum requirements are for 24 hour forecasts plus a brief outlook for sea areas to be broadcast on Navtex and INMARSAT SafetyNETTM. . Within the spirit of SOLAS, but going beyond the minimum, the UK Coast Guard currently broadcasts Inshore Waters forecasts on marine VHF and on MF. Likewise around the coasts of most European countries. In a very welcome change of policy, the UK, like both France and Spain makes the same texts available on the Internet as a free service in the interests of safety.
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