
Ventusky – Weather data visualization - misotaur
https://www.ventusky.com/
======
lllr_finger
This is a great visualization of free data, although not the first in this
style, but it's usefulness in actual forecasting or nowcasting is rather
limited.

Interpolation between sparse grid points can result in missing fine details,
like the subtle boundaries that kick off the most violent storms in the
central Plains.

Limiting to just GFS and GEM make sense from a proof of concept level, however
these are long range models that play in the 10-16 day range. GFS in
particular uses a 13km spaced grid that isn't convection allowing, meaning it
can't model individual storms well. GFS is typically only output every 6 hours
as well so it can easily get out of sync on forecasts for the day of.

It would be great to see these types of visualizations incorporate something
fast and higher resolution like the HRRR or even one of the NAM/WRF 4km
variants, but that is a _lot_ more data than what is currently being ingested.

The best weather information (for US citizens) hands down is still your local
NWS office. I'd recommend everyone bookmarking their site and following them
on social media.

~~~
alexose
Will GOES-16 improve the existing models? Or is the plan to create new models?
I'm really curious to know how the higher resolution images will be used.

~~~
lllr_finger
Current models ingest new data from a variety of sources, including surface
observations, buoys, airplanes, and GOES-derived data. The derived data might
be more accurate and might be used more extensively going forward - I'm not
entirely sure.

IMO (as an amateur) the bigger impact is for convective meteorologists that
are continually watching satellite imagery and the work that places like CIMSS
are doing in analyzing satellite imagery and detecting patterns indicative of
severe weather. These detection algorithms will have a higher degree of
confidence and can be triggered several minutes earlier now - possibly
providing earlier warning for tornadoes.

CIMSS proving ground: [https://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/goes_r/proving-
ground/SPC/SPC.ht...](https://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/goes_r/proving-
ground/SPC/SPC.html)

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davidjgraph
Very nice, although default of Fahrenheit, really? The date format is ISO
rather than US by default. Maybe a master switch [US|Countries in the 21st
Century] 8-)

~~~
patatino
My default was celsius. Firefox, language de

~~~
wazari972
Connected from France, Firefox in english, default was °F

~~~
GrantSolar
Is that localisation EN-US or EN-GB?

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lorenzhs
It's °C for me with EN-GB

~~~
RandyRanderson
deg F,

windows: en-ca chrome: EN-US Physically in Canada

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pawelduda
Looks very similar to Windytv
([https://www.windytv.com/](https://www.windytv.com/)). Are these websites
somehow related?

~~~
piokuc
They are both very similar to
[https://earth.nullschool.net/](https://earth.nullschool.net/) which is open
source: [https://github.com/cambecc/earth](https://github.com/cambecc/earth)

~~~
tomslavkovsky
It is not any longer, the last update on github was made 3 years ago. Now
Cameron works is not publishing new features on github.

~~~
anc84
Which features does the website have that are not in the repo?

~~~
tomslavkovsky
eg WebGL support which was added last year in November

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hrodriguez
Does it make sense to anyone that this kind of data should be layered on
regular mapping applications (directions, traffic, shops)? Or is it too much?

I like the idea of visiting Google Maps, for example, and being able to toggle
_snippets_ of this kind of weather data onto the map itself. Other useful,
one-click, toggles could include:

1\. Real Estate Listings for a given area

2\. Demographics

3\. Forecasts & Historical weather info

4\. Crime data

5\. Local Events

6\. Low-bandwidth settings

7\. Access to publicly available real-time streaming cameras

~~~
maxerickson
If you are in the US, you can add a kmz to Google Earth to get some of the
weather stuff:

[http://www.nws.noaa.gov/gis/kmlpage.htm](http://www.nws.noaa.gov/gis/kmlpage.htm)

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dagw
While it is undeniably both beautiful and really cool, I've yet to see
anything that beats a meteogram[1] when it comes to actually understanding at
a glance what the weather is likely to do over the next couple of days.

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meteogram](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meteogram)

~~~
anotheryou
is there an online source for that? (preferabley with coverage of europe for
me)

~~~
dagw
The android app Yr, from the Norwegian met centre will give you an up to date
basic meteogram for most of the world. They (yr.no) also have an API if you
want to download just the image for your own uses.

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sccxy
Love this kind of weather visualisation.

I'm fan of Windytv. They also offer free API:
[http://api.windyty.com/](http://api.windyty.com/)

So I made tracker for around the world sailing race (Vendee Globe):
[https://gis.ee/vg/](https://gis.ee/vg/)

It makes so much easier to follow big weather patterns.

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a-ve
Great website.

On a side note, you can see the Himalayas doing their job:
[https://www.ventusky.com/?p=32.15;78.51;6&l=pressure](https://www.ventusky.com/?p=32.15;78.51;6&l=pressure)

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CalRobert
Cool! This reminds me a bit of weatherspark, which used to have a fantastic
tool for visualizing long term trends. What were the 10th/50th/90th percentile
temps for a given day over the last 30 years, etc. I wonder if the data sets
here could be used to build something similar.

~~~
superkuh
Everyone misses weatherspark. It's been a year since they went down and
there's still no replacement for their historical weather viewer. I know they
decided to stop because their flash based API for the radar map was
depreciated but even _just_ the historical and predicted line plots of weather
data I'd pay money for.

Ventusky is no weatherspark replacement and I don't think the models they're
drawing their data from would work for one.

~~~
CalRobert
Do you know if weatherspark used public or private data sources? I've been
working on some open source data visualization tools and if the data sets were
public perhaps we could build something with weather data sets in mind.

~~~
ropeladder
After WeatherSpark shut down I spent a few minutes poking around weather data
sources before getting overwhelmed and giving up. It looks like they get all
their historical data from Weather.gov. (WeatherSpark lists their data sources
here: [https://weatherspark.com/about](https://weatherspark.com/about) ...and
weather.gov appears to have their data available for download from NOAA:
[https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/](https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/))

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dublin
Sure seems to be a lot of Fahrenhate here... Hey, look at it this way - the
more granular Fahrenheit degrees (roughly half (5/9) a Celsius degree) are
more useful for determining comfort - including setting a thermostat: I've had
a couple of European cars that clearly used degrees Celsius for their setpoint
(even if displaying degrees F, usually skipping by twos). Way too often, it
simply wasn't possible to set the AC comfortably - it was either too warm or
too cool. This matters in Texas...

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xjay
Related: Site for tracking lightning/thunderstorms [1].

Warning: Sound is on by default. Disable by clicking Sound in the menu on the
lower left.

[1] [http://blitzortung.org/](http://blitzortung.org/)

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datl25
This "cyclone bomb" is terrifying
[https://www.ventusky.com/?p=49.1;-27.3;3&l=pressure&t=201702...](https://www.ventusky.com/?p=49.1;-27.3;3&l=pressure&t=20170206/12)

Is it even possible?

~~~
dest
I would guess it's a standard propagating structure. For other readers: winds
at 80km/h rotating with a diameter of ~2000km. Pressure drops at 935hpa in the
center

edit: at 10m above the ground. at higher altitudes, it's quite faster and with
a different shape

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mrestko
Number one criteria I look for in weather sites is that they pin my CPU to
100%.

~~~
TallGuyShort
You co-locate a lot of other workloads with your novelty weather
visualizations, do you?

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philfrasty
For remote locations I find the NASA worldview pretty accurate for weather
predictions. Just came back from the Seychelles, basically any weather
forecast was completely off.

Just by looking at the NASA satellite images you could roughly predict the
cloud movements for the next day and though next sunshine :)

EDIT: link
[https://worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov](https://worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov)

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opticalflow
Well, I for one find this pretty cool, especially the part where you can
select the altitude. As a licensed remote pilot, this gives me a good idea of
winds aloft at-a-glance without having to parse an entire full-briefing with
all METARs, PIREPs, AIRMETs, and whatnot. My main question is the "altitude"
in this AGL (above ground level) or MSL (mean sea level)?

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CamperBob2
Looks nice. Lots of gratuitous bouncing when using the scroll wheel to zoom,
though (Firefox 48.0, Win7). The effect is somewhat unsettling.

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blondie9x
Great stuff let's not forget
[https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/ort...](https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic)

~~~
rtkwe
It's very interesting being able to drag the different projections around.

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aneidon
I'd love this as a live wallpaper. Anyone if there's an easy way to make that
happen?

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finid
Looks far better than Weather.com and accuweather.com

~~~
maxerickson
I like forecast.weather.gov:

[http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lat=40.6936&lon=-89...](http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lat=40.6936&lon=-89.589)

No geoip, but a lot of information, right from the source.

The NWS radar pages are also pretty good (and again straight from the source):

[http://radar.weather.gov/radar.php?rid=ilx&product=N0R&overl...](http://radar.weather.gov/radar.php?rid=ilx&product=N0R&overlay=11101111&loop=no)

There's 4 different display options for each radar, I usually use the simple
loop one:

[http://radar.weather.gov/ridge/radar_lite.php?rid=ILX&produc...](http://radar.weather.gov/ridge/radar_lite.php?rid=ILX&product=N0R&loop=yes)

They also have regional overview pages:

[http://radar.weather.gov/ridge/Conus/centgrtlakes_lite_loop....](http://radar.weather.gov/ridge/Conus/centgrtlakes_lite_loop.php)

Click to zoom to a local radar page.

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omegote
Just so you know, wind in Spanish is "viento", and "ventusqui" is an informal
way to call the wind. So yep, they've copied both the concept AND the name of
windytv.

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IgorPartola
The zoom on this thing is out of control.

~~~
madhorse
Same, touching the scroll wheel yields unbearable UI confusion for about a
minute.

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neptunespear
I only have a minor complaint: It only lets you view real time data and
forecasts up to 2 weeks out; there's no archived data like
earth.nullschool.net (which has data going back to 12/2013). If there were a
site like that, or even a way of creating a DIY site that uses archived
numerical data but maintains a similar UI/visual appeal as Ventusky (e.g. the
wind streamlines, which I think look much more appealing than on nullschool),
I would pay actual real money for this product.

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djmill
This site is great - and it looks like there are others out there too.

I use this for backpacking and astrophotography to figure out precipitation
and cloud patterns (as to not waste a drive out). Very helpful!

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chrisdone
I think making sense of the scale of weather would be aided by an accurate
world map like the peters projection or something of that nature that doesn't
do Eurocentric seafaring things like put Greenland as being the same size as
Africa when Africa is like 11 times larger in reality. For example, with a
proper map, the fact that much of the northern Atlantic landmass is heated by
the sea would make more sense -- it's a much smaller area in reality than is
represented.

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0x1d
Wow the visualization is great. Probably not as useful as a standard weather
website, but blown away by the design.

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tehsauce
This pales in comparison to the much more detailed, beautiful, featured, older
visualization at [https://earth.nullschool.net](https://earth.nullschool.net)

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synacksa
I remember using this site to watch the projected path of the last hurricane
that happened (I forget it's name). It was an amazing visualization tool.
Forgot about it since then.

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ISNIT
I personally prefer
[https://earth.nullschool.net/](https://earth.nullschool.net/) I find it works
better with Mac Trackpads

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nathancahill
Looks like Dark Sky[0] has a competitor. I'll probably use both of these side
by side.

[0] [https://darksky.net/](https://darksky.net/)

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sovnade
Now I know who to blame real-time for this cold morning.

It was you, Minnesota.

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mrfusion
Offshoot topic. How can I find the windiest places in the us?

I'm looking to move somewhere warmer and I was thinking a strong consistent
wind would mitigate the hot summers.

~~~
pqs
I live in a windy place, in Europe, and I suggest you to reconsider your
decision.

~~~
shitgoose
where is Europe? Brussels?

~~~
pqs
No. I live in Spain, in an area close to a river delta where it is very, very
windy. I also lived in a windy island for many years.

Wind, when it is strong enough, can be very uncomfortable, even dangerous.

I guess that what you are looking for are places with a sustained sea breeze
in summer. However, these places tend to have high relative humidity, which is
not comfortable.

~~~
shitgoose
thanks!

reference to Brussels was a weak attempt at a joke:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windy_City_(nickname)#Politics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windy_City_\(nickname\)#Politics)

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andai
It seems many people have their locale set to en-us, but don't like seeing °F,
inches etc.

Go to Menu > Settings > Language > English [en]

That will give you °C, mm, etc

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midgetjones
Nice! Although it would take a lot to get me away from
[https://darksky.net/](https://darksky.net/) now.

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beezle
Reminds me a little bit of when I used Vis5d back in the 90s to look at the
weather model data. This is quite nice.

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krick
What do these indexes below the "Thunderstorm" mean? Why are visualizations of
them so different?

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lngnmn
How could it show anything meaningful for places where no weather data is
collected, like Tibet or Nepal?

~~~
piokuc
Majority of weather observations come from satellites these days.

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divbit
Beautiful. This should be used to introduce vector fields in Calc 3 /
Manifolds type courses.

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saycheese
Confusing how the wind is animated, nothing else is; for example, the temp,
precipitation, etc.

~~~
dancole
> Confusing how the wind is animated, nothing else is; for example, the temp,
> precipitation, etc.

There is a play button in the bottom left to animated the currently selected
heat map over time.

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saycheese
On mobile? If so, I'm not seeing it. Checked the settings too.

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Pavelcz
Check out how you can embed a snapshot and it keeps the animation! All in the
code, too!

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a3n
Nice, but the page takes my laptop's CPU from a quiet 2% to a whiny 100%.

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snarf21
Very neat, I wish the water areas showed water temperature, not air
temperature.

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keeganjw
When you zoom out, it makes the Earth feel like a living creature. So cool!

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davidw
I'm somehow reminded of The Scream. Beautiful site, though.

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jojoo
nice ui.

i won't switch from meteoblue which has more features, a similar ui and more
and much better models, at least for europe.

~~~
tomslavkovsky
[http://Windytv.com](http://Windytv.com) is providing Meteoblue's NEMS model
and you can compare weather models...

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okidwiyulianto
Can not convert to Celcius. The default is Fahrenheit.

