July 2013 Boards forecast contest

waterways

Saw the 29.5°C at Mt Dillon too. Congrats M.T.!

rameire

just as a reference for the bonus question,
Belmullet had 12.4 hours of sun yesterday 9th.

Quickelles

This good weather is really ruining my score.

MT - could I withdraw (to avoid embarrassment) ?

Rikand

rameire wrote: »

just as a reference for the bonus question,
Belmullet had 12.4 hours of sun yesterday 9th.

Going to be a write off on Saturday. The only bit of cloud coming for the rest of the month is coming on Saturday and it's hitting the north west aswell

M.T. Cranium

The lowest temperature I found (and this may not be it) so far is 7.9 C recorded on the 6th at Moorepark. Even today (meaning Thursday actually I guess it's Friday now) it would be tough to predict how much sunshine might occur on Saturday in Belmullet, would currently expect 6-8 hours rather than whatever I guessed back in June.

Con Sensus, by the way, could get pushed down quite a long way this month, the way the guesses line up even the mercy rule won't help the bottom half of the field and of course Con Sensus is at the top of the bottom half of the field as always. If it warmed up more and reached 17.5 and the extreme min did not change, then Con Sensus would have 7 points for the first three categories and whatever could be gleaned from the rest, which could be around 15/35. The problem is that quite a few of us need to take a hit on some part of our forecast to push Con Sensus off the cliff so we'll all go together I guess, with one or two exceptions).

I don't feel that safe with the 29.5 although the mercy rule pretty much guarantees some points there no matter how high the next warm spell drives the mercury up.

pauldry

I'm in line for a total of 15 points this month but love droughts so don't care, your right mt as always, 29.5 won't last

Your forecasts were spot on and met eireann don't believe in long range forecasts all boardies do

rameire

1.2
Im thinking I put the decimal point in the wrong place for my entry.
I can't believe it was only 1.2 sunshine hours.

Tae laidir

rameire wrote: »

1.2
Im thinking I put the decimal point in the wrong place for my entry.
I can't believe it was only 1.2 sunshine hours.

Sometimes, us Eastcoasters forget the diference in weather over such a short distance on the West Coast.
I will never forget my summer holidays in Achill, though it was almost 40 years ago!

M.T. Cranium

Well, rather ironic that I managed to pick the one really cloudy day in this warm spell for the bonus question, and the max of 10 points will go to Tae laidir (4.4h), nilhg (4.5h) and both Rocky Bay and Quickelles at 5.0 hours. Will score in groups of four then three down to the end of the table on this one.

Meanwhile, the max at Oak Park on the 12th remains shrouded in mystery which means that we'll have to wait to see if it broke the 29.5 reading in place, there was an hourly of 30 reported so it likely did. I would estimate that the IMT is now around 17.4 although some missing data prevents an exact calculation. The next week will maintain it at that level or even raise it slightly. Precip is now down around 20% from those showers on the 2nd -3rd, and sunshine must be pushing up well above 150%.

If these trends continue, Jpmarn will have a score well into the 80s and I will have less work than usual scoring the table because usually I have to move all the forecasts around in the scoring, this time they may just line up the way they are now with a bit of juggling to do. Would say that seafields and 200motels came closest to anticipating the extreme nature of the drought if these numbers hold.

Quickelles

And that's about the only thing I'll have fluked in this month's contest!

Tae laidir

:eek: Looks like our Annual Leader Dasa29 is going to have a stinker.
I hope Harps or I can do enough, else I fear you-know-who will be in the lead!

M.T. Cranium

Unless the end of the month screws up the rainfall, you (Tae laidir) are more or less guaranteed ten or fifteen points more than Con Sensus, harps is running closer because of a lower min forecast (but if he gets that to go, he's in that position).

Therefore I am afraid you are correct, Con may edge ahead of everyone despite a really low score. I'm saying this without looking up the exact numbers, some people are going to beat Con by 40-50 points at least but they are probably more than that amount behind.

M.T. Cranium

IMT now confirmed to be 17.6 C after 14 days, and the max remains 29.5 as Oak Park tied that on 12th.

Harps

Danno's station in Durrow had a max of 30.1C, not a synop station but it should be mentioned in the Monthly Bulletin

M.T. Cranium

I'm not sure if Harps is aware, but Met-E publish a "Monthly Summary" right after the month ends, and a more detailed "Monthly Bulletin" months later.

Some or all of you likely knew this, but every day there are reports from about twenty stations around Ireland and these form the basis for our contest.

I rarely look at the later published Summaries and I don't even know offhand what stations are reviewed in addition to these primary stations. Maybe I should find out. But to score the contest, I have to go with what's available right after the month ends.

Here again, I don't know if Harps meant much by his comment and I'm not looking at it as a complaint or anything like that. From my point of view, the more stations consulted, the better -- but of course many of us predict our numbers on the basis of what we know about the system used, if I thought Danno's station would be in the mix (and other inland sites) I would have added a degree to my prediction probably and bet some others would too.

Meanwhile anyone higher than the current 29.5 has another shot at it this weekend into early next week. The IMT has probably edged down to about 17.4 as of today (it was 17.5 through Monday), rainfall must be less than 20% and sunshine above all our predictions at 170%.

Harps

Think you took the comment the wrong way, certainly didn't mean it as a complaint or anything like that!

Think I'm getting the Bulletin and Summary mixed up, I rarely read the brief summaries at the end of the month so wasn't aware that only the synop stations are included. The Durrow station is a climatological station so it'll probably be mentioned once the Bulletin is published

As we were then, 29.5C max!

M.T. Cranium

Sorry, I didn't take it badly at all, I was a bit distracted as I posted because it was on the way to the forecast post that I make each morning, and I just couldn't find the words that matched what I was meaning to say, which were more or less what you just said about the Bulletin and Summary.

I think there's a point to be made for one or two additional daily reporting Met-E stations in the inland southeast and perhaps somewhere closer to Waterford too. However, I guess budgetary constraints prevent that. Ironically, my budget of zero did not constrain me from making a fairly accurate long-range forecast, perhaps the answer is to cut budgets to zero in all cases.

Quickelles

M.T. Cranium wrote: »

Ironically, my budget of zero did not constrain me from making a fairly accurate long-range forecast, perhaps the answer is to cut budgets to zero in all cases.

MT. They'll be sticking pins into rag dolls with your image in ME!

M.T. Cranium

I wouldn't expect such boorish Canadian behaviour in a civilized country like yours.

How did you know about the voodoo dolls, I thought that was a state secret?

Danno

Harps wrote: »

Think you took the comment the wrong way, certainly didn't mean it as a complaint or anything like that!

Think I'm getting the Bulletin and Summary mixed up, I rarely read the brief summaries at the end of the month so wasn't aware that only the synop stations are included. The Durrow station is a climatological station so it'll probably be mentioned once the Bulletin is published

As we were then, 29.5C max!

Now and again climatological stations will get a brief reference in the Monthly Summary which is produced on the first Monday (Tuesday where BH happens) of the following month.

I am unaware of nearby stations (Fethard-in-Tipperary, Athy, Littleton, Derrygreenagh, Lullymore and Edenderry) beating 30.1c as of today, however they might indeed have recorded higher and may not come out of the woodwork until near Christmas when the Monthly Bulletin is produced.

Stations: http://www.met.ie/about/weatherobservingstations/climap.asp

M.T. Cranium

The IMT was on 17.8 C after the 18th and could drift up above 18 by Tuesday. After that it seems likely to start a gradual fall back through the 17s but probably not below our high water mark of 17.0 in the forecasts (Jpmarn).

Precip -- rainfall continues to be essentially zero from the 4th onward and now sits at only 17% of normal. This is bound to increase somewhat as scattered showers find our eleven randomly scattered rain gauges.

Sunshine don't worry about that one, locked into a finishing value above 150% if we even manage 50% from here on.

M.T. Cranium

Mount Dillon has nudged the max up to 29.6 (Friday). More to come?

M.T. Cranium

IMT is at 18.2 C which may prove to be its highest point but I don't think it can possibly come back below 17 now. Rainfall has just begun to find our grid of stations but will require a few days to get to 50% possibly.

M.T. Cranium

It just came to my attention that Clinton Daly and vandriver entered the contest after I made up the table (I spotted dacogawa).

Clinton Daly would be playing off about 40% penalty but vandriver was too late entirely, sorry the penalty pretty much implies 6th is the last day for entries.

M.T. Cranium

Provisional scoring for July
____________________________

Many of the categories seem to be settled and heading towards the "mercy rule" of minimum scoring progression. Rainfall remains somewhat unforeseeable with these very heavy showers around, with a history of missing the eleven stations used in the grid on the MS, if one ever parked over a station it could distort the outcome as foreseen at this point which is about 50% normal rainfall (some locations have had 200% but they are mainly in the north or inland southwest between grid points). So with all that in mind, and given that my plans include some down time and off-line absences in early August, I am posting this provisional table for now, and it might be a bit later into August than usual before I update this and calculate the annual updates. Have added clintondaly to the existing table as he entered on 5th, score was lower than penalty so by the newest of my many mercy rules he gets 10 for showing up. Vandriver showed up on the 18th which meant that the van had left without him.

(scores marked * are increased to meet "minimum scoring progression" rules ... the MAX barely stayed ahead of that)

FORECASTER _________ IMT _ MAX _ MIN _ PRC _ SUN _ BEL-13th
......................................................................................................
==============================================

Provisional values _____18.0 _ 29.6 _ 7.9 _ 050 _ 170 _ 1.9

Jpmarn ______________23* _ 04 _ 19 _ 06 _ 09* _ 03 ____ 64
mickger844posts ______20* _ 12 _ 02 _ 08 _ 07* _ 07 ____ 56
lostinashford _________ 18* _ 00 _ 00 _ 02 _ 05* _ 03 ____ 28
nilhg _______________ 16* _ 15 _ 00 _ 05 _ 05* _ 10 ____ 51
M.T. Cranium _________16* _ 19 _ 00 _ 05 _ 08* _ 03 ____ 51
keith96 _____________ 13* _ 00 _ 01 _ 05 _ 08* _ 03 ____ 30
harps _______________13* _ 08 _ 00 _ 08 _ 06* _ 06 ____ 41
cherryghost __________11* _ 00 _ 19 _ 02 _ 06* _ 10 ____ 48
Tae laidir ____________11* _ 07 _ 03 _ 06 _ 07* _ 10 ____ 44
seafields ____________ 11* _ 00 _ 00 _ 15 _ 09* _ 06 ____ 41
dacogawa (-15) ______ 11* _ 16 _ 11 _ 02 _ 03* _ 07 ____ 50-15=35
okla ________________11* _ 00 _ 00 _ 03 _ 04* _ 08 ____ 26
Joe Public ___________ 06* _ 17 _ 00 _ 05 _ 06* _ 07 ____ 41
DOCARCH ___________ 06* _ 13 _ 00 _ 02 _ 03* _ 09 ____ 33
jd __________________06* _ 12 _ 10 _ 02 _ 04* _ 03 ____ 37
Rickylovesuall ________ 03 _ 04 _ 00 _ 05 _ 08* _ 01 ____ 21
kindredspirit _________ 03 _ 06 _ 01 _ 04 _ 07* _ 08 ____ 29

Con Sensus __________ 03 _ 00 _ 00 _ 03 _ 04* _ 06 ____ 16

traecy.1 _____________03 _ 07 _ 06 _ 03 _ 04* _ 08 ____ 31
200motels ___________ 02 _ 18 _ 00 _ 12 _ 09* _ 00 ____ 41
bsal ________________ 02 _ 00 _ 07 _ 02 _ 00 _ 04 ____ 15
clintondaly __ (-35) ____ 02 _ 00 _ 00 _ 12 _ 00 _ 05 ____ 19-35= 10
waterways (-5) _______ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 06* _ 02 ____ 08-05= 10
snowstreams _________ 00 _ 06 _ 00 _ 02 _ 04* _ 08 ____ 20
pauldry ______________00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 02 _ 04* _ 09 ____ 15
talkabout ____________ 00 _ 06 _ 09 _ 02 _ 04* _ 08 ____ 29
rameire _____________ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 02 _ 03* _ 01 ____ 06=10
strasser _____________ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 02 _ 03* _ 05 ____ 10
Jerry Seinfeld _________00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 05 _ 07* _ 06 ____ 18
homolumo ___________ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 02 _ 05* _ 03 ____ 10
Rocky Bay ___________ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 10 ____ 10
john mac ____________ 00 _ 00 _ 12 _ 00 _ 02* _ 06 ____ 20
delw ________________00 _ 00 _ 19 _ 02 _ 01* _ 09 ____ 31
quickelles (-5)_________00 _ 00 _ 11 _ 00 _ 00 _ 10 ____ 21-5=16
dasa29 ______________00 _ 00 _ 00 _ 05 _ 06* _ 04 ____ 15
H2UMrsRobinson ______ 00 _ 00 _ 15 _ 02 _ 00 _ 09 ____ 26
_______________________________________________________

I won't bother to re-order these yet partly to show that the scoring more or less follows the order of IMT predictions with a few notable exceptions

This is looking like the lowest scoring month in quite some time. Hearty congrats to Jpmarn who almost ran the tables on this one, mickger844 and nilhg as well as yer host having at least a marginal clue as to what lay ahead, and cars spun out at every bend in the track. :eek: Even Con Sensus was befuddled by this month. :pac:

Now, if it happens to rain heavily over 2-3 of the grid stations or there's a lower MIN than I expect, some of these will change considerably so don't entirely lose hope. Eventually a final version will appear.

Minimum score is 10 so if you didn't gather that many eggs in your basket you come away with ten anyway.

pauldry

I got 15 but theres a deluge for tues wed and thurs so hope yet,

rainfall could be up on 80percent by aug 1


also maybe dublin airport could do a coldie for me ,

no such luck

min temp in Sligo this month was 11.2c at the start of July has been over 14c every night since July 6th and today was the first day since then that it wasnt over 20c (it made 19.6c)

quite a remarkable July
await Met Eireann Summary to see just how warm its been

Tae laidir

pauldry wrote: »

I got 15 but theres a deluge for tues wed and thurs so hope yet,

You can include Thurs in August Forecast!

It would have been interesting had we answered the May Bonus Question in July.

'Predict which date in May will produce the largest total rainfall in Ireland.'

M.T. Cranium

A wet end to the month may indeed raise the scores in that category but pretty much across the table, only one or two scores would fall so the general outcome would be about the same only with a few more points for everyone.

The distribution of the eleven stations is somewhat skewed to the southeast which could be drier so I'm not too optimistic that percentages will come up much higher than the 60s overall. A revised table should be available by about 2 p.m. Thursday.

pauldry

Yeah I thought Thursday was 31 July

I had actually predicted a warm dry and sunny month but still end up stumped

Think Aug will be cooler and wetter but could be wrong

M.T. Cranium

Currently estimate that the whole field will gain 6-7 points thanks to the rain approaching the southwest tonight, so if tomorrow turns out atrocious at least that provides a silver lining. Don't see much hope anywhere else in the scoring.

Nelson Muntz to Con Sensus: ha ha.