Friday, February 17, 2012

The shipping forecast

There's poetry and there's prose that's poetic.

The BBC's Radio 4 shipping forecast is an essential tool for the working sailor but it has a magic all of its own.

Dogger, Fisher, Bight....

Issued and broadcast four times a day it gives wind direction, strength, wave heights, weather, visibility and a sense of security all in one go.

Thames, Dover, Wight.....

The idea of having a weather forecast for mariners came originally from Admiral Fitzroy, famous for being captain of Charles Darwin's voyage around the world on the Beagle.

Fastnet, Shannon, Rockall.....

Now the shipping forecast is 90 and there are while there are threats to long wave transmissions, in one form or other it will be informing those at sea and hypnotising those on land for years to come.

Portland, Plymouth, Fiztroy

Find out more by watching the reading this BBC story and watching the short video here.



Picture from: The Met Office.

2 comments:

Tillerman said...

I miss Finisterre.

If you can read this comment I only had to enter one word to prove I'm not a robot.

JP said...

Yes, Finisterre did sound good, but Fitzroy deserves the honour.

However much I like the shipping forecast must admit that nowadays do all passage planning online - so much more information readily available to hand.

Its only when offshore for multi-day sails that R4's long wave range comes into its own