Enrichment
Animated live global weather - and now, forecasts
5th January 2017
A new website and web app is allowing geographers to analyse real-time weather conditions as well as forecasts over a week ahead. In combination with synoptic charts, the two together can help visualise the weather changes a developing synoptic situation is indicating.
Synoptic weather charts have long been available on the Met Office website. By scrolling down to 'Specialist forecasts' and clicking on 'Surface pressure charts' you can play the forecast change in meteorological conditions over the next few days.
With a new facility by WindyTV (twitter handle: @windyTVcom ) you can see how synoptic conditions are being translated into weather features, including wind strength and direction, temperatures (air and sea), precipitation, cloud and much more. With a scroll bar at the bottom giving forecasts for up to nine days in advance, the weather forecast has never been more visually accessible. Nor has understanding how different synoptic conditions are associated with changes in the weather, anywhere around the planet.
Andy Day
Andy recently finished being a classroom geographer after 35 years at two schools in East Yorkshire as head of geography, head of the humanities faculty and director of the humanities specialism. He has written extensively about teaching and geography - with articles in the TES, Geography GCSE Wideworld and Teaching Geography.