Fuel for Thought

Smart Weather

In the old days, the cb radio was the best, current to the minute, on the ground source for weather information. Just call out to the trucks coming from the opposite direction for road conditions ahead. But the cb information is really only good for a short distance ahead when the weather is changing fast. There is weather radio, but I pretty much save it as a last resort. Me being from “out of town”, I’m usually not familiar with the names of counties and geographic reference points that the local weather broadcasters use, so it’s a chore to follow the reports. Now we have access to online weather reports, which provide near real time weather that is precise, big picture, and visual.

When I downsized to a van I left my cb radio behind. The cb was one more chunk of weight I needed to consider, and my laptop computer won the decision. Before my smartphone days I relied on the big name weather websites. I bookmarked the weather radar and forecast pages. Between the weather radar and forecast I had a good idea what was happening around me locally and what was headed my way. When driving if weather was becoming an issue, I could stop, boot up the computer, and see what kind of conditions I was heading into. A number of times I’ve based my decisions on what the maps showed. One time I would sit tight and let the weather blow past. Another time I would see that the bad stuff was only a very narrow front, so I carefully proceeded and punched through it. Some times I’ve gone around it. Links to webcams are helpful too. The webcams show the real time activity along the route, so I can see if traffic is moving and what the road conditions look like. The big drawback of the computer is that I turn it off when I’m driving. If I need an update I have to stop, boot up, hope I have a good signal, and browse my way to a website, or several.

Then came the smartphone. Almost all my weather bugging these days is done on my phone. I’ve completely settled on the weather app from Weatherbug. Somehow Weatherbug gives me more detailed information that is more up to date and easier to navigate and read than the typical weather website. Within one or two taps I can load radar maps and forecasts of my current location—right now. A large part of my existence involves trying to avoid pollen, so I really appreciate the accuracy of the Pollen.com pollen map that connects through Weatherbug. I find it interesting to compare the pollen map to the other weather maps. Like today, the rain is washing away a huge band of pollen across the Midwest. I’m looking forward to the freeze that kills off this season’s ragweed too.

For those who still like big maps, graphs, and data in general, there is a new entry in the weather website world. I like it a lot, and I’m watching its progress closely. Weatherspark.com pushes the majority of its weather write-ups to the back and pulls the visual information forward. Something like a smartphone app adapted to the large real estate of a computer monitor. If I always had my computer running, I would probably have Weatherspark set as my homepage. It even has a weather history timeline that is an extension of the current weather timeline, so you can look up what the cloud ceiling was anywhere in the US on the day you were born (1948-present).

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