Some Thoughts on Weather Forecasting

I am amazed at how far we've come in predicting the weather. Saturday I called off Sunday church services because the forecast said we'd have snow and ice between 10AM and 1PM. The skies were clear at 9AM Sunday and I wondered if that was a mistake. But at 10, we got snowfall that lasted until around one. Then it got warm enough to melt the roads later in the afternoon, just as predicted.

When I was a kid, the TV weather report would say something like we have a 50% chance of snow between one and four inches in the next couple of days. We'd wake up not knowing whether there would be school or not, and the poor principal had to get up at five or so to make the call. In the early '80s, when I was doing the morning show in a mountain town, the local principal would call me to see how my drive to work was. I lived close enough to walk if the roads were dangerous, which is likely why I had the morning show. In the 21st century, schools get the word out a day ahead, because the forecast is just that accurate.

This morning, I checked the forecast and saw that I may be stuck inside for a few days. But the snow won't start until 10, and the temperatures won't plunge until one, so I went out and got some supplies for a project I can do indoors. Modern meteorology is amazing.