150th Anniversary of Shipping Forecasts

[Paul]

Saw this earlier, and thought it may be of interest. 

The Met Office shipping forecasts have been going 150 years:

Quote

The Met Office is celebrating 150 uninterrupted years of the Shipping Forecast, which is believed to be the longest running continuous forecast in the world.

The first gale warning was issued following a violent storm in 1859 but it was not until 1867 that gale warnings at sea were issued on a regular basis and they have continued ever since.

The Royal Charter storm off the coast of North Wales in 1859 led to the deaths of 800 people and the loss of 133 ships.  Following this tragedy Robert FitzRoy persuaded the Board of Trade to allow him to start storm warnings in a bid to prevent tragedies like this happening again. 

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/news/releases/2017/150th-anniversary-of-the-shipping-forecast

Also, something I'm sure @johnholmes & perhaps @knocker can tell us, what was it like to work on that first ever forecast?  

[knocker]

30 minutes ago, Paul said:

Saw this earlier, and thought it may be of interest. 

The Met Office shipping forecasts have been going 150 years:

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/news/releases/2017/150th-anniversary-of-the-shipping-forecast

Also, something I'm sure @johnholmes & perhaps @knocker can tell us, what was it like to work on that first ever forecast?  

I can tell you how much it was valued with an example. I was serving on Ocean Weather Ships at the time of the Cod War and we definitely were not honoured guests in Iceland. But fast forward to the end of the trip and we were steaming up the Clyde looking forward to some leave after a grotty 5 weeks at sea on Station Alpha when we heard that the Scottish trawlers were blocking the Clyde at Gourock letting no shipping past. But fear not when they heard it was a Weather Ship they parted ranks to let us through like the parting of the Dead Sea.

Heaven knows how many lives the forecast has saved over the years and and has always had been greatly appreciated by mariners and this still remains the case.

Edited August 24, 2017 by knocker

[johnholmes]

Yes a definite listen to for very many years for me. It was used when involved with weather weekends in the Welsh hills. The actual weather prior to the forecast gave a good indication of what the synoptic pattern was and this was then used to illustrate what weather to expect in the Welsh hills/mountains. It usually worked quite well, all prior to the days of umpteen TV forecasts in every region, and of course long before the internet.

[Frosty.]

There are warnings of gales in Viking, North Utsire, South Utsire, Forties, Cromarty, Forth, Tyne, Dogger, Fisher, German Bight, Humber, Thames, Dover, Wight, Portland, Plymouth, Biscay, Trafalgar, FitzRoy, Sole, Lundy, Fastnet, Irish Sea, Shannon, Rockall, Malin, Hebredes, Bailey, Fair isle, Faeroes and Southeast Iceland...The general synopsis at....followed by sailing by