[BC] TV Weather

[RichardBJohnson at comcast.net]

Many years ago, the Boston area had a real weatherman,
Don Kent. He is still alive, living somewhere in the backwoods
of Maine, I understand. Since he was a local weatherman,
with the knowledge of how the local terrain speeds up, and
slows down the passage of weather activity, his weather
forecasts were incredibly accurate by today's standards.
In those days, every piece of federal land had some sort
of weather station on it. These weather stations, reporting
barometric pressure, wind direction, wind velocity, and
temperature, were interrogated hourly at 60 baud. Some
weather stations had dew point as well, but those required
an operator. From tens of thousands of such weather stations
across the land, the National Weather Service would generate
reports and maps. These were accurately prepared by real
AMS technicians who learned their trade under the tutelage
of masters. These methods went away in about 1970, replaced
by a handful of NWS employees in Florida who look at
satellite photos and pretend that they can obtain surface
weather from them. Airports that retain a federal control
tower can provide the barometric pressure. Pilots call this
the "altimeter setting." Very few federal control towers actually
provide the barometric pressure to the NWS anymore.
Between Albany and Boston, Windsor Locks, Connecticut
is the only reporting station! This means that nobody knows
what the weather is doing in the Berkshires. For all practical
purposes, there is no weather forecasting anymore. The
talking heads on television claim that they are referring to
computer models, but no actual modeling exists. Instead,
a few reports are compiled, with some least squares fitting
of pressure contours that were assumed, but not measured!
As a pilot, I can get this garbage from FSS (Flight Service
Station). At one time, the weather was something like what
was being reported. This is largely untrue now. In the past
ten years, when planning an IFR flight because of poor weather,
I have never encountered forecast weather en-route, simply
because nobody knows what is happening between the
metropolitan areas anymore. TV weather casting is just
some spew for selling commercials --nothing more.


--
Cheers,
Richard B. Johnson