surf report: wind direction

bungan's picture
bungan started the topic in Tuesday, 22 Oct 2013 at 4:16pm

Hi Ben, just wondering if the wind direction as given in the torquay forecasts is from the aireys inlet lighthouse (and is basically real time) as per old website format?
Cheers Dave B (aka Bungan!)

thermalben's picture
thermalben's picture
thermalben Wednesday, 23 Oct 2013 at 9:34am

You've raised a good point Dave - one we've already created a ticket for (ie to be fixed). That is, we need to display the AWS location.

However you are correct - Torquay is using Aireys Inlet for live winds.

On the other hand, the 'forecast winds' are straight out of the computer model, which is based on a data point near Torquay. The Surf Coast often experienced local effects which result in different winds to what are forecast (which is what we would have previously adjusted manually on the old site) and that's one of the trade-offs with the new website.

However we are building a small workaround for that which we hope to deply in the next month or two.

We will also try to label 'model' winds and 'observed' winds as much as possible (actually, there are three kinds of winds - computer model forecast, AWS recorded, and surf reporter observed (by our team of reporters).