Websites for WeatherTERRY GILLESPIE, LAND RESOURCE SCIENCE, UNIVERSITY OF GUELPH

If you use your webbrowser to search for theword "weather," you will

.sr,."PQ5\V'<!' find hundreds of siteslisted. So the few sites I've chosen for dis-cussion in this article will just get youstarted. There are many additional linksto follow from these sites, and I encour-age you to keep on weather surfin' andhave fun!

I've divided my suggested sites intothree groups. The first group called "Out-looks and Past Information,' includes sitesthat cover time scales that are one weekor longer into the future or the past. Thesecond group I have labelled "Forecasts,"and these sites cover just a few days intothe future. Finally, I'll suggest a beauti-fully illustrated "Learning Site" if weatherturns you on and you would like to knowmore about how it works!

Outlooks and Past InformationStart by browsing www.cmc.ec.gc.ca.

1. Click on Forecasts: Charts and Bul-letins, then scroll down the next page to

near the bottom of the page, and click onMonthly. Here you will find a map of theforecast temperatures for the next 30 days(updated on the 1st and 15th of the month).The map is divided into three categories:Above Normal, Near Normal, and BelowNormal, The interpretation of these cat-egories is as follows.

The past data from the same month overeach of the past 30 years is divided intothree groups; the warmest one-third, themiddle one-third, and the coolest one-third. If the forecast map says "AboveNormal,' it means the temperatures areexpected to be like one of the past yearsin the warmest one-third. Or said anotherway, forecast temperatures are expectedto be warmer than any of the past yearsthat landed in the middle one-third. Simi-larly, a "Near Normal" forecast meanstemperatures are expected to be like themiddle one-third of past years, or a "Be-low Normal" forecast suggests anupcoming month like one of the previouscoolest one-third. In item 2, below, I'llshow you where to get an idea of what

temperatures actually occurred in thewarmest, middle and coolest thirds in thepast.

2. Go back to the bottom of the previouspage (click the Back button of yourbrowser) and click on Seasonal insteadof Monthly. This will open a page thatgives you the option of a TemperatureAnomaly map or a PrecipitationAnomaly map. These maps are dividedinto three equal categories of "Above,""Normal" and "Below" corresponding tothe warmest or wettest, middle, andcoolest or driest thirds of about the past30 years, just as for the monthly tempera-ture forecast described above in item 1.You can look at the current seasonal fore-cast, or forecasts for future seasons.

To get an idea of what the past tem-perature or precipitation values looked likein the top, middle and lower thirds, go towww.msc-smc.ec.gc.ca/ccrm/bulletin/archive.htm. This site will lead us to theseasonal temperatures and precipitationvalues over about the last 50 years in

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ranked order.These listsdon't quitematch the 30year periodsthat the up-per, middle

and lowerthirds are based on and they are

for Canada as a whole, but if you breakthis list into thirds (groups of 18 years)you will get a good idea of what Above,Normal, and Below mean. Once you getto the archive site, do the following:• in the table, click on the most recent pastseason of interest (e.g. Winter 199912000)if you are interested in winter season data.• in the first paragraph on the page thatcomes up, click on winter temperaturedeparture tables.• below the new table that appears, clickon Full Period. Now you will see theranked data for the past 53 years.

3. Interested in Climate Normals? For alist of stations and what weather variablesare observed, go to: www.cmc.ec.gc.caJclimate/normals/eprovndx.htm. Click onthe province of interest. Click on the newpage, then click on the station of interest.

Weather ForecastsHere we start by going to the most

popular Environment Canada site:weather.ec.gc.ca.4. When you arrive at the home page forthe weather site, click on Current Con-ditions and Local Forecasts. Then on thenext page, click on your province of choiceand a list of cities will appear. Click onyour city of choice. This will get you toweather forecasts that go out to the 5thday into the future and are frequently up-dated.

5. Go back to the home page for theweather site and you can get a quick over-view of the weather at the other places inCanada by clicking on the National Fore-cast Map. This map shows the majorpressure systems and fronts (borders be-tween mild/warm, cool/cold air masses).Maps like this are used by meteorologiststo prepare the forecasts seen in item 4above, and you can look to the west ofyour location on this map to see whatmight be coming down the pipe in the nextfew days.

6 • MARCH 200 1

6. Return again to the home page for theweather site and click on Canadian Ra-dar (or RADAR images at the bottom leftof the page). Here you find you can choosevarious regions across Canada, and withineach region you can choose a compositeimage of all stations or the individual sta-tion that suits your location best. This willgive you a recent still image of precipita-tion in the region and allows you to spotwhether a band of precipitation is aboutto arrive or depart your location. It's usu-ally helpful to view the radar image withthe map from item 5 in mind because theprecipitation is often associated with lowpressure regions or weather fronts.

7. Back to the home page and click onSatellite Imagery. Again you can chooseyour region of interest, and you can choose10.70 micros or Visible. The 10.70 mi-cron image is taken with a camera that"sees" heat radiation (infra-red radiation)of much longer wavelengths than we candetect with our eyes. There is a scale alongthe left hand side of an image that showscolours corresponding to the temperaturesat various places across the image (be alert- the colours may be reversed, so blue iswarmer than red). Cloud tops will becooler than the ground, so this image letsus spot areas of cloud during day or night.The visible image will show cloud duringthe daytime only, of course. At night thevisible image will just be black.

The satellite page also allows you todownload animations which play the last48 images in a loop. This is a great way tosee the progress of weather systems acrossthe country.

Let's now leave the EnvironmentCanada site and go to the mother lode ofweather information sites.

8. Who knows why someone at the city ofSarnia would set this up, but go to:www.sarnia.com/weather.

Clicking on the various entries in thetables on this page will take you to a smor-gasbord of weather information, includingsome of the sites we have already visitedabove. A couple of my favorites are:• click on Radar (second item, secondrow). I like the "loops" that are listed inthe left hand column of the radar table thatcome up. These allow you to see theprogress of areas and lines of precipita-

tion and plan short term activities accord-ingly. Just scroll past the commercials atthe top of the page that comes up, wait abit until all the images load, and then theloop will start to play.• go back to the Sarnia weather home pageand click on Satellite, then try the USASat loop (last entry, top row) to see an-other version of an animated satelliteseries.

There is lots and lots more weather stuffto explore at this site!

Learning SiteIf cruising the Sarnia weather site wets

your appetite to learn more about how theweather works, ww2010.atmos.uiuc.edu.is a beautifully illustrated site to visit.

9. Click on Online Guides along the lefthand side of this home page and you'llarrive at a menu of learning modules thatincludes Meteorology, Remote Sensingfrom Satellites, Interpretation of WeatherMaps, and Projects (for spouses who areteachers or science fairs for your kids).

10. Click on Current Weather on the leftside of the home page, then try SurfaceProducts. This leads to a page with manychoices of beautifully illustrated surfaceweather maps. I like the Sea Level Pres-sure with Temperature and Sea LevelPressure with 1-R Satellite maps thatcombine the pressure pattern with the tem-perature and cloud patterns. Or you canclick on Satellite from the CurrentWeather page and see a variety of satel-lite images. The surface and satelliteimages can be animated by clicking theAnimate, then Play buttons at the bottomof the image that comes up.

These pages have suggested only a fewof the many, many weather-related sitesthat are on the internet. From these sites(especially the Sarnia weather site) thereare lots of links to explore. Mark Twainonce said, "If you don't like the weather,just wait awhile." Now all you have to dois left-click!

If you discover some exciting newweather site, or new uses for the weatherinformation you find, I'd be delighted tohear from you. Send me a message attgillesp@lrs.uoguelph.ca. Happy weathersurfin'! •