Blog: Ships at Sea and using the right tools

[windfind]

Hi Gang,

Here is a quick blog about picking the right forecast tools even if the right tools is a slow-moving freight ship heading towards South America.

https://blog.weatherflow.com/west-coast-wind-blog-ships-at-sea-and-using-the-right-tools/

Mike Godsey
iwindsurf.com/ikitesurf.com
Weatheflow.com

[justall]

That’s pretty cool. What percent of ships report these data and at what frequency?

[windfind]

Hi Justall,

Tough questions to answer since ship are not required to send reports and many don't bother or only do it sporadically. The information is gathered by the VOS (Volunteer Observing Ship Program) This web site has some information: https://www.vos.noaa.gov

Unfortunately, you can not just look at the wind reports without looking at the reporting time since they may be too old to use.

Still, it is a useful forecasting tool.

Funny, years ago I only had my window and primitive models that could barely resolve the entire Bay Area. Now I have models down to 1 km resolution, dozens of cams and great satellite imagery etc. If only we had the old Bay Area summer weather the forecast accuracy would be amazing. But now every year brings on new patterns to figure out. Like... eddies in April!!!!

It is like being an archer and every time you begin to make more bullseyes the gods make the target smaller and smaller!

Mike Godsey
iwindsurf.com/ikitesurf.com
Weatheflow.com