Topic: Natures weather forecast,

[Don R]

 Sometimes my cell phone, the national weather service and radar aren't as accurate as what my senses say. It smelled like rain, the breeze on my skin felt like rain, the sky looked like rain, but the weather app on my phone showed a 4% chance and there was nothing on the radar.
 So, I rode the bike to breakfast this morning and got wet anyway. It was still worth it.

[HondaMan]

We used to have an ex-Air Force forecaster (called "Stormy" Rottman, don't know his real first name) on TV here in the 1980s. He was 100% accurate, all the time. His understudy was on after Stormy's retirement, and he was about 80% right until the 1990s. It's really hard to predict the Rocky Mountain Front Range, one of the toughest in the country.

Then we got this crew(s) on all the local channels. They are 100%, but not 'right'...they are utterly wrong, every single day. It's stunning to watch.

[PeWe]

I have noticed that rain can sometimes be very local, over me where I ride ; D

I have some roads where it will rain when clouds are around or can.

I have ridden in direction against dark clouds from blue skies and white fluffy clouds.
After 20-30 minutes, the dark clouds look  like 100% waterfall.
Turned back home to meet horrible clouds that have just popped-up from another dimension.

5-10 minutes from home attacked by rain.

"I should not have ridden the 10- 15 minutes longer route!"

Not only one time!

[RAFster122s]

The Air Force meteorologist aren't allowed to be wrong as flight operations are affected. They update forecasts dynamically when weather fronts push in or afternoon heating changes things... But, they are typically very very good at even giving weather forecast initially with these dynamics factored in...only small tweaks usually...

[HondaMan]

...only small tweaks usually...

Oh, yeah: Stormy's signature line every summer night was like, "If it doesn't rain where you are, it will be a nice summer day."
Around here we get local rainshowers that last 10 minutes almost anyplace during a normal summer.

He was uncanny with the winter weather, though: I never saw him miss a storm.

[seanbarney41]

Here in Michigan, the weather is easy to predict.  Just ask yourself if you are enjoying the weather.  If yes, it will change very soon.  If no, it's gonna stick around for a while.

[Stev-o]

We are in a drought down here in Central Texas, although July was wetter and cooler than usual.

Many times there is a high chance of rain, it appears to be coming on the radar but then it does the "Spicewood Split", it breaks up near the local town of Spicewood and we end up with nothing!

[PeWe]

Here in Michigan, the weather is easy to predict.  Just ask yourself if you are enjoying the weather.  If yes, it will change very soon.  If no, it's gonna stick around for a while.

That is familiar!
The weather forecast in apps is not reliable either.

I had a ride yesterday after work despite guaranteed rain showers.
The sky looked good enough and off I went.
Not a  drop, a burger happened though!

[Don R]

 We just got in our annual downtown car cruise, we missed the rain this time and actually had a 26-hour interval between severe thunderstorm warnings. We had Joe Zolper from the garage squad TV show, 0260 TV, and promoter of the Builder's Brawl drag race as our celebrity guest. He was awesome, brought along his Daytona Charger drag car and his own hand built toter home.

[70CB750]

My observation is that long term forecast is somewhat accurate, but short time corrections are often wrong.

Say, they call for rain on the weekend 10 days ahead and than the rain disappears from the forcast and on that weekend it rains anyway.

My forecast is Wunderground.com.