"WEATHER FORECASTING EXTRAORDINARY."

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 794, 18 April 1910, Page 4

"WEATHER FORECASTING EXTRAORDINARY."

Sir, —AYjth.not a little disgust I road "A Nortlierly's" lottcr, much punctuated by'notos of'exclamation, etc., in to-day's Dominion regarding. the Government meteorologist. Your corre-. spondent m.ust indeed have little to do when he will, rush into newspaper correspondence when tho weather prophet's forecast does not turn out oxactly to the letter. It is, you' will, I think,• agree, sir, generally recognised that since Mr. Bates was appointed to the position of Government weather observer'ho has rendered invaluable service to the community in tho way of correctly forecasting storms even • to tho hour, and nine times out of; ten his predictions havo been infallible.

Now, sir, if ."A Northerly" .will refer to the. weather reports for Thursday, he will.see that , a heavy- westerly! gale was exporienccid throughout New Zealand, which (as forecasted) changed to a southerly in tie South. Island tho same evening and worked up as far-as Capo Campbell .where its , force was nullified to a' certain extent,, by the prevailing stronger westerly blowing in Cook Strait, and therefore it did hot reach Wellington. There is evidence that the southerly storm predicted for Friday prevailed in the' south, although no information-was available on account of the. interruption of telegraph lines. I would like'to point out' to' "A Northerly" (1) that the galo which raged here yesterday wa:s' from the west'(and not from the .north as, he. .says With' exclamation) although the wind blew from the north-west, and . (2) that westerly weather does not necessarily, and in fact seldom, provail in Wellington from due west, .but"usually comes by way of either nor'-west or south-west.

The latter part of his letter calls for no comment, except I may suggest that yesterday's- "northerly" probably caused him some inconvenience (perhaps .a good drenching) and.that may be the reason of his petty dissatisfaction of the- weather observer's forecasts. Apologising sir, for trespassing so much on your valuable time and' the space of your paper,—l am, etc., A KEEN WEATHER OBSERVER.