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Old 02-16-2008, 10:35 AM
Skyway Scott
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Most of those wind forecasts truly should say "For entertainment purposes only".
The biggest problem is that the wind forecasts are for fairly large areas. Right off the bat you have a problem. As we all know, different patterns for wind exist in different areas within the forecast region. Souths tend to have a few areas where the wind is amplified. Northeasts the same thing, sea breezes the same thing.
Also, different times of the day can amplify the winds or diminish them differently depending on where you are. At EB, Souths almost always peak at 1-2pm. I don't even leave my house until noon anymore on a South.
Then it's almost always over (at EB) by 4:30. It's just how it is. There are rare exceptions, but that's a pretty strong pattern.

If I were you guys up North, I would start building on your observations for your area over a few seasons and learn to notice patterns. Once you do, you will be much more well equipped than even the best WxMan to make reasonable stabs at wind for a particular area. Those guys (Wx) do know what they are doing, but the areas they are asked to predict for in terms of wind pretty much screw them right off the bat. I bet if we had Steve Jarvey riding with us and he started to care about making micro-forecasts, he would nail the wind forecast for EB every time. .
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