Predicting the Wind and Weather

NauticEd International Sailing Education forms a strategic partnership with Predict Wind.

Read this full article and learn how to get a FREE 3-month subscription to Predict Wind.

All that would be pretty cool – right?

Well, welcome to the 21st century! And welcome to the Predict Wind App!

Predict wind is a company that has gathered all the top weather prediction model information and presented the information in a super user-friendly manner onto your mobile device and on your computer.

What that means is that you can have your cake and eat it too. It means that in one place you can find present conditions and predictions for just about anything you need weather-wise including ocean currents and swells.

What is a Weather Model?

Pretty simple! It is a software program that takes the current conditions of the weather and then based on other known parameters like landmass and shape, temperature, frontal systems and anything you can think of that might affect the weather, then the software program makes a prediction of the coming weather. The software program constantly updates its predictions based on the new current conditions as time progresses. Over time the models become more and more accurate because the meteorologists observe what actually happened vs. their predictions. They then refine the software. We say “simple” but there are probably millions (and millions) of lines of software code in the model. There are lots of different models that have been written by various groups around the world and each model will obviously predict slightly differently because the software is different and the meteorologists who help write the software have different ideas about what happens from an initial set of conditions.

For more information of the various type of models see this help site on predict wind.

What Does a Prediction Look Like?

This is the strength of Predict Wind. The display of information comes in many forms to help the user (you) gain the best information the fastest.

The Daily briefing is a quick snap shot of what to expect. Here is a shot of Tuesday morning in the BVI.

You can also run video animations of the coming conditions over the next week. In this video you can see the wind direction and strength (denoted by the color key at the bottom of the video) in the Caribbean.

Or you can get a Table view of the next week. Here is Auckland New Zealand over the next few days.

Anywhere in the world, you can get an accurate picture of what the weather is doing and what it is highly likely to do.

Listen to our Podcast on Predict Wind

The 1910 Galveston, Texas hurricane killed between 6,000 and 12,000 people. In those days, no one had any idea what was about to descend upon them. Now, we have all this information above at our fingertips. The trick for most is where to get the information and how to understand what the information means.

NauticEd’s relationship with Predict Wind will help sailors be more aware of weather conditions before venturing out and will also educate sailors about how to read and understand the information presented.

All NauticEd students taking any of the Skipper Courses (Skipper Small Keelboat, Skipper (Large Keelboat), RYA Day Skipper Course) or the NauticEd Weather Course will gain a FREE subscription to the full professional version of Predict Wind for 3 months in addition to learning in the course how to use all the features of the Predict Wind information.

Sign into NauticEd now and dive into any Skipper Course or the Weather Course.