NORFOLK, Va. — When it comes to forecasting weather, there are so many great tools to help us make decisions.
We live in a world where model output is available 24/7, 365 days a year. You can put in your address or use your location, and with a simple tap on the screen, there's a detailed forecast.
However, that forecast information is usually populated by data from a forecast model. And there are many, many models that can sometimes point to completely different projections for the same location and time.
When 13News Now meteorologist Craig Moeller forecasts the weather — especially with developing or potential tropical systems, he is much more interested in the trends surrounding the possibilities.
A model one day can say a storm is going to develop and slam a coastline in a week.
Six hours later, the same model can project the storm system to be hundreds of miles from where it had been in the previous update. Or worse yet, it may not have developed at all!
That's why we like to look at model run after model run. And that goes for a bunch of model outputs all at once!
When you see a spaghetti plot that looks fairly similar over several model runs, or when the models in the plot start moving toward an agreed solution, the chances of the storms following that thinking are significantly higher.
Another trend that caught 13News Now's meteorologist's attention Thursday morning is the National Hurricane Center's forecast chances for tropical development with an area near the northern Bahamas.
Wednesday the chances were 10%-20% over the coming week. Early Thursday morning they bumped the chances to 30%. By the mid-morning update, the chances were up to 40%.
At a glance, a 40% chance of development may or may not get your attention. But when you think about it going from 10-20% yesterday to 40% this morning, it bears watching.