Category Archives: Weather forecasting

Reducing climate change from aviation: could climate-friendly routing play a part?

Posted on 29 May, 2017 by Stephen Burt

By Emma Irvine It’s commonly known that burning fossil fuels, like in jet engines, leads to the emission of carbon dioxide (CO2) which causes global warming. It is perhaps less well known that, particularly in the case of aviation, carbon … Continue reading →

Posted in Atmospheric chemistry, aviation, Climate, Weather forecasting | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Nice weather, atmospheric blocking and forecasts

Posted on 11 April, 2017 by Stephen Burt

By Oscar Martinez-Alvarado With the beginning of spring (either the ‘meteorological’ spring on 1 March or the ‘astronomical’ spring on 20 March, as the Met Office explains here), the UK and indeed the whole Northern Hemisphere start experiencing warmer weather. The … Continue reading →

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Observation uncertainty in data assimilation

Posted on 20 March, 2017 by Stephen Burt

By Sarah Dance Approximately 4 million properties in the UK are at risk from surface-water flooding which occurs when heavy rainfall overwhelms the drainage capacity of the local area. Several national weather centres have been developing new numerical forecasting systems … Continue reading →

Posted in earth observation, Numerical modelling, Remote sensing, Weather forecasting | Tagged , | Leave a comment

How can a hurricane near the USA affect the weather in Europe?

Posted on 31 October, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By John Methven It may seem bizarre that processes occurring within clouds near the USA, involving tiny ice crystals and water droplets, can have an influence on high-impact weather events thousands of kilometres away in Europe, and our ability to predict them … Continue reading →

Posted in Environmental physics, Measurements and instrumentation, Numerical modelling, University of Reading, Weather forecasting | Leave a comment

Where is the high probability?

Posted on 24 October, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Peter Jan van Leeuwen To determine the uncertainty in weather and climate forecasts an ensemble of model runs is used, see Figure 1. Each model run represents a plausible scenario of what the atmosphere or the climate system will do, … Continue reading →

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Why does it always rain on me?

Posted on 27 June, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Helen Dacre Last Monday morning I got so wet on my cycle to work that I had to spend 10 minutes under the hand dryer in the toilets to stop myself looking like a drowned rat. Being the keen … Continue reading →

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Predictions and errors

Posted on 30 May, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Javier Amezcua Predicting is one of the most ambitious goals of science. It goes beyond describing and explaining, and it attempts to “tell the future”. The prediction process has the following basic steps: We have an estimate of the … Continue reading →

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A Random Blog

Posted on 23 May, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Peter Clark As a young scientist I was introduced to turbulent flow in the traditional way – we consider an ‘infinite ensemble of realisations’ of a random flow, and split each realisation into the average over the ensemble and … Continue reading →

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Improving jet stream forecasts through observational experiment

Posted on 28 October, 2015 by Stephen Burt

By John Methven Weather systems developing over the North Atlantic and hitting Europe are intimately related to large-amplitude meanders of the jet stream, known as Rossby waves. Characteristic weather patterns grow in concert with the waves, and the jet stream … Continue reading →

Posted in Environmental hazards, Environmental physics, extratropical cyclones, Numerical modelling, Weather forecasting | Tagged , | Leave a comment

What will the weather be like in 3 weeks time?

Posted on 5 October, 2015 by Stephen Burt

By Steve Woolnough This may seem like a silly question, and whilst weather forecasts can’t tell you if it will be raining at lunchtime three weeks from today, they may be able to tell you whether in 3 weeks it’s … Continue reading →

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