Windy.com introduces soaring forecast

CaribooYJ

Excellent addition! Thanks!

SwairCare

@korina
waiting for thermals/ soaring to be finished.😀
I have a question and proposal for enhancing the the thermal layer GUI/ view according to many comments.
Q1: thermal Hight = usable hight? - is cloudbase defined as usable hight when clouds is formed by the thermals?

Proposal:
P2: have "elevation curves" for usable thermal hight (incl
cloudbase )
P3: the colour indicate average climbrate..
(as completely they can be calculated on known data )
P4: keep cloud symbols.
P5: wind Particles animation (no colour) "under" point P2 -P5above.

with these in same view, I believe this will be a great overview where the flying conditions is the best..
(use to decide where to go and get a good general overview in a little wider area.
Also possible to see general routes for long distances.
for more details, most users probably look at different parameters /layers to make up their mind how flying will be
/brgds
sverker.forslin@gmail.com

hemersonr

great feature!!! I am using for planning my flights here in brazil

Aberhangie

@Korina HI Corina.
As a Glider and Hang Glider pilot I like the idea. So far though not proving too useful. Cloud base is not that useful on it's own , the speed of convection (m/s vertical) is more important as when this drops to less than the glider sink rate you stop going up! Have a look at how RASP (https://rasp.stratus.org.uk/index.php/rasptable-desktop) works, in particular the "Star Rating" and the "Thermaling height" .

Nice to see this type of feature arriving on Windy!

Thanks

Rikou04

Excellent, une précision très satisfaisante
Je suis sur Planeur sur LFNF ( Vinon sur Verdon )
bon Vélivole

Mariusz Pozniak

Thanks for more layers added for Thermals. I am more and more convinced to use this feature. But the range (altitude) of lifts is not all we (gliders pilots) are looking for. Most important is the average themal strength (the vertical speed which we sse on variometers while climbing). Is it something conected to the buoyancy of the air particle? Can you consider to add such thing? Best regards. Mariusz Poźniak

quebectango

The granularity of thermal height is not fine enough.

Keshka Kotera

I like it very much. Done in such a way that a huge amount of information is shown at a glance. Since it is new and I have only just started using it, accuracy is in question.

OBTW, I asked and they provided! NOAA is now creating a soaring forecast for Baker City Oregon! WOOT! Perhaps you can integrate some of their information?

Korina

@Keshka-Kotera We will consider it, thank you.

alex.panzeri

Not only for pilot it will be useful but also for sailors, I would say that 90% of inshore regattas are governed by this meteo event.
On lake of lecco/como, we have 2 wind, Tivano, from North from around 05-06:00L till 10:00L and later the Breva from south from 12-13:00 till 16-17:00 (maybe you are more familiar with those on Lago di Garda, l'Ora and Peler).
We are using also the graphic of the Swiss Pressure Gradient of the Foehn to have a trend indication.
As I'm an ex pilot with aeronautical Technical’s degree at high shcool and a decade at airspace engineers, it's sad to see sailors don't assimilate the concept of Thermal (in theory with a barometer it's possible to make some forecast of the field).

idefix37

@alex-panzeri said in Windy.com introduces soaring forecast:

it's sad to see sailors don't assimilate the concept of Thermal

I don't entirely agree with you. At sea, when we look at the coastline lined with cumulus clouds to confirm the sea breeze conditions, we say that 'the thermal is developing', that is to say that the breeze will soon establish itself in the afternoon. Even if the knowledge of sailors on the thermal is not so thorough, they know at sea the reasons for the coastal breezes.
For those who sail on lakes in mountainous regions, the thermal is a very good indicator of the coming mountain breezes on these lakes. But it is still necessary to know very well the local winds direction, or to use high resolution models such as AROME or ICON-D2 on Windy on wider lakes.

mipaolino

It works pretty well in South America, thanks for adding this feature

nielsdavison

nice addition t windy, would be nice to see calculate speed of lifting

rbarbs

The thermal layer is useful as a very broad overview, but it is too inaccurate to use meaningfully beyond 'the day looks interesting'.

The sounding plugin very accurately predicts cloudbase/top of climbs. If this layer could use the same algorithm as that, it would be brilliant.

On a related note, I find the new 'sounding' that is embedded in windy better than the old one, but again the sounding plugin is far simpler, more accurate (within the boundary layer).

Nellybonelly

I like it a lot. Adding an airspace display would be very valuable for planning soaring flights.

Filip_K

@Nellybonelly You can add airspaces from openAIP using Airspaces plugin

Cub Driver

Thanks for adding this forecast to your model. I’m a glider pilot with over 1000 hours. SkySight is a great example of what competitive glider pilots are using now.

ajbeevers

Hi @Korina and team,

It's fantastic you introduced the UKV model, but there seems to be an error in the thermal map. Somehow, particularly earlier in the day, there's a lot of grey indicating zero thermals whereas other models (and indeed the UKV soundings) suggest thermals.

I've noticed this on several days, but as an example please see the screenshots below of tomorrow's forecast @1300.

UKV
UKV