RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN FORECASTING OF WEATHER AND CLIMATE.

The operation consists of three stages: data acquisition and processing, analysis, and prediction, and consists basically of forming a 3-dimensional representation of the conditions prevailing through a large volume of the atmosphere at a particular moment of time, and of predicting, from an observed initial stage, the future evolution and movement of atmospheric disturbances and their associated weather. Using standardized observations and measurements, made simultaneously at fixed times over a large part of a continent or even a hemisphere, and exchanged rapidly between different countries in universally agreed codes over a special global network of satellite, cable, radio- and picture-transmission channels, charts are constructed to depict the current distribution of atmospheric pressure, temperature, humidity, winds, etc. at the Earth's surface and at a number of levels in the upper air, and from these are evolved forecast charts showing the conditions expected some hours or days later.