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Posted on Thursday July 23rd at 11:08 a.m.
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Snowco's forecasting model is produced by MetOcean (MSL). MSL have extensive experience in the collection and analysis of MetOcean data. They have produced a model for Snowco based upon latitude, longitude and altitude figures which produce the data that you see in the forecast on Snowco.
Problem with wind (and to some extent other variables) is really that often the resorts are in valleys, or have specialized local conditions from some aspects due to surrounding mountain ranges and the model simply doesn't resolve at that level.
To improve the accuracy to unprecedented values Snowco and MetOcean need historic instrument collected data from the forecast points. Snowco is hoping to receive data from selected ski & board areas in the near future to further increase the accuracy of these forecasts.
I have been analysing these forecasts since Snowco started publishing them 3 years ago and I can say that they are brilliant out to about 4 days and can be used as a guide further out than that. They perform not worse than competing products which are on the web today.
As far as my forecasting skills go, I have been analysing forecast data from an increasing amount of sources for ten years specifically to analyse the snowfall potential and weather patterns for the NZ Mountains. Before the current southerly storm, for about two weeks no-one got the forecasts correct more than about three days out. That is the nature of long term forecasting.
What Wikipedia defines forecasting as:
Forecasting is the process of estimation in unknown situations. Prediction is a similar, but more general term.
Weather forecasting is the application of science and technology to predict the state of the atmosphere for a future time and a given location. Human beings have attempted to predict the weather informally for millennia, and formally since at least the nineteenth century. Weather forecasts are made by collecting quantitative data about the current state of the atmosphere and using scientific understanding of atmospheric processes to project how the atmosphere will evolve. Once an all human endeavour based mainly upon changes in barometric pressure, current weather conditions, and sky condition, forecast models are now used to determine future conditions. Human input is still required to pick the best possible forecast model to base the forecast upon, which involves pattern recognition skills, teleconnections, knowledge of model performance, and knowledge of model biases. The chaotic nature of the atmosphere, the massive computational power required to solve the equations that describe the atmosphere, error involved in measuring the initial conditions, and an incomplete understanding of atmospheric processes mean that forecasts become less accurate as the difference in current time and the time for which the forecast is being made (the range of the forecast) increases. The use of ensembles and model consensus help narrow the error and pick the most likely outcome.
So any mug should know that whoever is doing it, it is an inexact science based upon facts and figures and human experience. It is a useful guide. If you're choosing to go riding on any particular day, just go and check it out based upon that ski areas report and the Snowco webcam images. If it is marginal just go up and take a look, some of the best days I have ever had have been at a tail end of a storm, (like this weekend) but it is anyone's guess exactly when the weather will clear on Saturday, but it will and the snow will be great.
By the way the whole country is set-up for an epic weekend this weekend with fresh snow and clearing skies on Saturday and clear conditions on Sunday (with some cloud and NW winds creeping in to the Southern Lakes).