A three-month forecast could soon be on track

Country Living with Frank Farragher

Seeing is believing could well be the best motto, after a recent trawl through the weather stories of recent weeks revealed that a newly constructed forecast model developed by UK scientists, could now be able to predict the weather forecast three months in advance with a potential 80% accuracy rating.

We might be inclined to say that we’ve heard it all before and the science of long term weather and climate predictions is fraught with dangers. Back the years, the BBC used always have a stab at predicting our summer conditions in early spring but they had second thoughts after their experience in 2009.

In a famous forecast at the end of April that year, the BBC stuck their necks out by predicting a warm and drier summer than average but one little phrase really stuck with them through that year and indeed ever since.

One unfortunate female presenter came up with what seemed a nice little catchline of it’s ‘odds on for a barbecue summer’, raising the hopes of millions of people across the UK.

Of course we all know what happened next. It rained ‘cats and dogs’ for the three months of summer with barely one barbecue possible from Cornwall to Newcastle, so since then, the ‘Beeb’ really pulled in their horns and refrained from any longer term predictions.

Across the board, most of  the main forecasting agencies stick to just five days in advance although some now venture as far ahead as 10, but the accuracy level falls off alarmingly for the latter half of such predictions.

With such resources, weather models and satellite aids, it’s little wonder that Met. Eireann’s Evelyn Cusack gets a bit hot under the collar at times, when a New Zealand maths teacher, like Ken Ring, continuously pops up with seemingly outrageous long term predictions based mainly on the influence of the moon on our planet or when Donegal postman Michael Gallagher predicts the winter ahead in September.

To make matters slightly worse for the scientists, Ken Ring sometimes does manage to get it right – whether it be by good management or good luck – as was the case with his prediction of the heatwave in Ireland last July.

The old codger from New Zealand hasn’t made a bad fist either of the spring so far with a rather uncanny forecast last November of a good spell of weather from March 7 to 17 – which we had – and he also predicted a settled spell between April 9 and 19, and that was ‘on the button too’.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.