Weather Forecasts

[facthunter]

I'd love to achieve a situation where we could obtain weather data for aviation use that you could understand Is it asking too much after all these years to be able to get weather affecting PLANES in PLAIN language. Now that we are a growing movement that may be able to express our views& shape our own destinies so to speak, & get something done. At a safety seminar at Melb. Uni about a year ago the question was posed Re. Avmet format. & I cant imagine anyone would want to retain the current arrangement ALL COMMUNICATIONS IN AIRCRAFT OPS.SHOULD BE UNAMBIGUOUS & CLEAR....N....

 

 

[PaulN]

Amen!! This topic was raised during a BOM seminar at last year's Wings Over Wagga. The presenter was fairly bombarded with objections to the less than clear data on ARFORs and TAFs. He said he'd look into it to see if changes could be made. Perhaps he forgot, or perhaps it's too hard, or perhaps we recreational flyers don't matter. Any which way, nothing has been done.

 

How aboutyou people going to WOW this year could attend the BOM seminar (if there is one) and press them a bit harder to make changes in the interests of safety.

 

Paul

 

 

[Guest pelorus32]

Noticed an article, in the news section I think, on the Basair website that listed a number of software apps for this. Apparently they take the BOM forecast and munge it into plain english. May be worth a look. I find deciphering the BOM stuff a bit of fun - but then I'm easily amused!

 

Regards

 

Mike

 

 

[facthunter]

Thanks fellas, for your comments. I think things are as bad as they have ever been and I'm not sure if BOM are the people to do it. We are the customers, and we should have a fair idea of what would work for us. When I have brought this matter up in a past life Legal questions were raised.Commonality across users international uniformity Bla, bla The point is that it is in coded form and quite difficult for the average user to use When you pass an airep or receive a sigmet it's in a form that can be understood so whats the problem? Therewas a time when a comprehensive individual forecast was prepared printed out, and personal briefings by qualified humans and an upgrade (revalidation )on each turnaround. Weather related incidents/ accidents are pretty attention grabbing (even if only for a short time in some of the worst cases).The levels we fly at we are either under it or in it . We need access to the best information preflight (&inflight) that can be obtained. Some of our aircraft have a seriously capable range and speed . N....

 

 

[Ben Longden]

The same question was asked of the BoM at the CASA CSI workshop in Shepparton.

 

Sadly the answer was to blame it on ICAO, as they write the standards...

 

Ben

 

 

[Wilfred]

I understand The forecasts are in the format with the easy to understand abbreviations as the forecasts all over the world are in english and in exactly the same format. There can be no confusion whatever your language or location in the world.

 

If you use them all the time it becomes easy .

 

Having said that

 

There is a free program that everyone I know uses to turn the forcasts into our idea of plain english.

 

It is on the SAAA Website

 

Link below

 

Go to the site

 

In the pull down menus select members

 

Then download Files

 

Then AC43.13.1B

 

Scroll down the page to Wayne Gills Decoder V2.0.1

 

Its free and an excellent program to turn your area forcasts to plain english. And it works a treat

 

http://www.saaa.com/

 

PS if anyone has trouble with this they can PM me their email address and i will forward the file. Its rather large 1.8 M zipped turtle

 

 

[mlpinaus]

Turtle is correct. Tried this, works well