Instant Weather Forecasting

A great pocket guide for those who like to get out and about in all weathers. I'm a biker and like to know whether to take my waterproofs and thermal gloves or if I can wear a lighter jacket etc. Hence my fascination with weather and predicting it's course.
This book has some lovely photos of typical clouds for particular weather formations. They're quite useful for predicting how a day will turn out if the previous day end with certain clouds or if the wind is in a particular direction.
A recommended read for hill walkers, bikers, sailors and farmers!

You need other books to make sense of this (55/56 people found this helpful)

I found this book interesting but, for me, flawed in several respects. The book contains some very brief information on cold, warm and occluded fronts - what they mean and how they behave. It also gives you a very handy cross section of a front, and shows you where the cloud formations you can see pictured in the book are likely to occur in the front.

But really any background information which put the cloud photos into context ends there. Unless you know a reasonable amount about how weather 'works' and interrelates, this book ain't going to help you much. To get the most out of this book, you're going to have to have read a basic book on general 'weather' first. That's not really a criticism of this book which after all doesn't claim to be a general book on the weather, but just a warning that it's of limited use on its own...and that perhaps it would have been much better with just a little more contextual background information.

More seriously flawed are the photos themselves. You get a photo of, say, cirrus clouds and then a description of the clouds' telltale characteristics and what significance they have for the forthcoming weather: "notice the fallstreaks striating towards the west on the upper cirrostratus...". The trouble with this is there is a photo of a whole skyful of layer upon layer cloud...there is absolutely no indication of which part of the picture the description is referring to, just some simple numbered circles on the photos would be useful so you knew which part of the sky the description is referring to. It's a little like giving someone a 1:25,000 scale map and telling them to look at the 'church with a spire'...there are dozens of 'em.

Finally, there's no indication at what time of the day, nor which direction the photos were taken which is fairly important.

I think in summary, using this book you'll be able to identify a cloud formation and even stab at a decent forecast from it...but crucially YOU WON'T KNOW WHY.

WYSIWYG (12/16 people found this helpful)

Sounds like a con doesn't it? well it isn't. If you have a degree of meteorological nous then this book can help you forecast weather. Great pics and a simple process. This book may not allow you to tell your pal if her wedding is ok 7 days hence but it will demystify a lot of skies and greatly enhance your understanding of the weather.

Instant Weather Forecasting

Alan Watts

Reader Reviews:

Weather Picture Book (18/18 people found this helpful)

You need other books to make sense of this (55/56 people found this helpful)

WYSIWYG (12/16 people found this helpful)

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