Addition of Fronts

AlanTheBeast

@Tomber42
Another site has this. It is potentially in digital form (after someone has drawn it) and can thus be obtained. Perhaps some data trading is in order?

Tomber42

@AlanTheBeast said in Addition of Fronts:

@Tomber42
Another site has this. It is potentially in digital form (after someone has drawn it) and can thus be obtained. Perhaps some data trading is in order?

Windy uses free open data only (except ECMWF and SAT Imaging)..

cyder

@idefix37

Yes by having a visualisation of temperature gradients mixed with moisture at each altitude. I don't think such visualisation is impossible to achieve/automate

peteh007

@idefix37 I too would like to see fronts - thus to be all to draw conclusions relate to the 'types' of clouds you see. And to draw parallels with traditional synoptic chart trading. eg. C.Nimbus == cold front. And to be able to access when it's arriving. If fronts are truly only generated by meteorologist's interpretations, then there is an algorithm or set of rules that they use. And so, these could also be translated into a graphical layer....
Just because people in the past have not done it this way, it doesn't mean that the future techniques could be even better...

So to correct your statement, it should have read, "Fronts have traditionally not been drawn by weather forecast models... but they certainly could be, once we were to create and implement the appropriate algorithms..."

peteh007

@cyder Exactly. A very good idea! It would be a superb addition.

speedlever

As a retired pilot, I recently discovered windy.com and the pilot weather app. I've always been a weather nut and run multiple weather widgets on my phone. The shortcoming of all of them is the lack of METAR and TAF info, which the Pilot app provides.

I discovered this conversation when I couldn't find any frontal depictions on the windy.com site. And now I know why. So no worries there. Thanks for a great site!

yavordjonev

I would like to second this request from a sailor's prespective.
It seems that ECMF produces weather front data already: https://apps.ecmwf.int/r/cdb/
It would very useful to see it in Windy.

jidanni

As much as I don't like talking to robots at customer service,
I must accept it anyway these days.
So I would be, yes, happy with artificial fronts drawn by robots (algorithms)
instead of real weatherpeople.

vsinceac

Afaik. that ECMWF front forecast are for Ensemble model; I wonder how could sailors cope with such a spagetti plot:

Bruzote

@idefix37 - (For those reading this old topic. :) Fronts on regular NWS surface analysis maps are MOST CERTAINLY done by computers, not meteorologists. Likewise, Accuweather stopped using manual analyses. The change in the NWS policy was done many years ago. I remember, as I was an active forecaster at the time. The quality of the surface analysis maps plummeted. Symbols for High and Low were computer-generated as well. The symbols were put all over the map and sometimes right on top of each other - really useless. The fronts were at times helpful, but sometimes poorly placed (I think nonsensical errors are quite rare now). The automated maps are not as helpful as hand-drawn fronts, especially when fronts had kinks or discontinuities. If you look at the NWS maps coming out of the WPC, it is apparent that someone at the WPC has an approval responsibility and their name goes in the legend. However, if you look at the product, it is CLEARLY automated. Perhaps the NWS allows for map tweaking, but certainly the primary products are automated. Eventually, AI will do this better than humans, but for now I don't know if that has been achieved yet. Work on this requires money and fronts are more for layman consumption or forecast conceptualization rather than forecast accuracy.