The quack holiday weather guide to this year’s summer

At this stage, it’s mostly quacks and entrepreneurs that engage in the business of long term weather forecasting, and it’s certainly a high risk venture even for the more reputable meteorological institutions like Met. Éireann and the BBC.

Met. Éireann desist from the practice almost completely, limiting themselves to a five day forecast, and while the BBC do offer a monthly guide for the weeks ahead, that tends to be weighted quite heavily on the side of generalities rather than specifics.

There is of course good reason for this, as the BBC and the British Met. Office has over the years scored a few spectacular goals in terms of predictions, so they are very careful now of dipping their fingers into the business of making long term seasonal forecasts.

Michael Fish’s infamous forecast on the night of October 15, 1987 – as a vicious storm was about to strike the south coast of England – is probably the most one that people remember and his famous quote can be found on thousands of websites.

"Earlier on today, apparently, a woman rang the BBC and said she heard there was a hurricane on the way . . . well, if you're watching, don't worry, there isn't!” That evening, the worst storm to hit South East England for three centuries, caused record damage and killed nearly 20 people.

Coming a close second, in the league of getting forecasts spectacularly wrong, was one given by the BBC in April, 2009, when the female presenter had the misfortune to use the term ‘barbecue summer’ for the months ahead.

All types of media love to latch onto catch phrases and as that summer unfolded, with the rains became more unrelenting through each passing day, the ‘barbecue summer’ sound bite never left people’s minds . . . and it still hasn’t.

Seasonal weather predictions are, for the most part, based on computer models factoring in a whole barrow full of scientific data, but when countries like the UK and Ireland are positioned on the edge of the great water mass that is the Atlantic Ocean, then changes can occur very rapidly.

The British Met. Office are hoping to ‘stick out their necks’ a little bit more over the coming years with their latest €100 million super computer that they hope will give them more accuracy in terms of long term forecasts, but we’ll be a bit like St. Thomas on this one: seeing will really be believing.

Closer to home, Donegal postman Michael Gallagher has built up quite a cult following with his long term predictions based on signs he daily observes in the natural world. When he has a long term ‘hit’ with a successful forecast, we all tend to hear about it, but not so much the ones that go wrong.

Of all the long term forecasters, New Zealander Ken Ring probably has the biggest world audience and a huge one too here in Ireland, but he’s a crafty old codger, with his 2015 Ireland Almanac priced at €35 with €16 for postage.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.