The Best Weather Forecast

With so much Kilchoan sunshine around at the moment, it seems an appropriate time to review the weather forecasts available on the net.

A clear, straightforward one is XC Weather. The main criticism of this is that it is limited, and that some of the colours used are confusing rather than helpful. It does, however, seem to produce a reasonably accurate forecast.

For graphic maps of the upcoming weather, MagicSeaweed is the best. Watching a depression heaving in from the Atlantic is fascinating - like the one we have heading our way on Monday, with 60+ mph winds forecast for the afternoon. It's a surfer's site, so it has useful features like swell and water temperature. It also displays both full Atlantic and World maps - the links to these are at the bottom of the page - so one can watch some even worse weather, like another big hurricane heading for New Orleans, and appreciate how lucky we are not to suffer such extremes.

A new one to The Diary is yr.no, a Norwegian site. This seems to give the best combination of animated graphics and solid, detailed facts, though some understanding of standard symbols, such as those for wind speed and direction, is needed. There are also, an the top left margin, a number of useful options, such as the 'Hour by Hour' one: if this isn't detailed enough, try clicking on 'Detailed' under this option. The Diary is informed that this is also a fairly accurate site.

Plodding behind all these is BBC Weather, with a clunky website and dated graphics. This site doesn't even offer Kilchoan as a location - the link here is to Tobermory - whereas the Norwegian site not only knows where Kilchoan is, but also offers an alternative link to Kilchoan Bay. The only thing good about the BBC site is that it hasn't - yet - promised Kilchoan a barbeque summer.

A recommended site for those taking to the great outdoors is the Mountain Weather Information Service. The link given here is for the West Highlands. Unfortunately, the area information can only be either downloaded and viewed or printed, or accessed by mobile phone. However, the site links in to some good Met Office maps - select 'Animated Synoptic Charts' in the left column - which seem only to be available from the Met Office direct if you register with them.

There are plenty of other sites, but most of the ones The Diary has found are even more dismal than the BBC. Most seem to worry less about the weather than cluttering up the page with simplistic data, or devoting as much space as possible to adverts. A good example of this limited forecasting is WeatherOnLine, where the options for locations are also severely limited - this link is for A'murchan, which is identifiable as Ardnamurchan because the weather is about right.

For most Kilchoan people, the weather directly affects their lives. Our two commercial fishermen lives depend on a good forecast, the fish-farm workers need to know what the weather is going to do, our crofters are heavily weather-dependent, and a poor long-term forecast is likely to affect the number of visitors coming here.

The Diary would be very grateful to its readers for links to other clear, accurate forecast sites, and for their views on the accuracy of sites.

Many thanks to Tom Miller, Ben McKeown and Richard Houston

for advising me on the best sites.