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MET ÉIREANN’S EVELYN Cusack has responded to criticism of the Irish weather service from a UK broadcaster who insisted Storm Fionn should never have been given a name.
Liam Dutton of Channel 4 News, a UK Met Office trained meteorologist, took to Twitter on Tuesday to take the Irish service to task over its decision christen the storm.
“#StormFionn that has been named by @MetEireann shouldn’t have been named,” Dutton contended, claiming it didn’t meet the required criteria.
It needs no more than a standard weather warning. It’s not even a low pressure with a storm centre, just a squeeze in the isobars. What next? Naming raindrops? It’s ridiculous!
The UK Met Office had earlier tweeted that the storm had been named by Met Éireann, adding:
… impacts are currently expected to be below warning limits in the UK.
Joint project
The Irish and UK weather services announced the joint storm-naming project in 2014 following a winter that saw a number of unofficially named storms – like ‘Darwin’ – make headlines.
“I can see his point in the sense that is wasn’t a traditional swirling vortex storm,” Cusack told Newstalk Breakfast today.
The forecaster added:
“We treasure all our citizens equally and we issued those warnings because of very high seas and very dangerous conditions in the south-west and west of ireland.
Recently there’s been some tragic deaths involving people swept off rocks and cliffs in very poor conditions.
Cusack observed:
I’m sure he didn’t imply any deep criticism of the Met Éireann meteorologists.
There is, it’s worth pointing out, a European forecasting group that coordinates this sort of thing – it’s called the WGCEF Task Team on Storm Naming and you can find out more about it here. Evelyn Cusack is the current chair of the organisation.
To be honest he’s right met eireann have gone crazy with weather warnings and naming every bit of wind as a storm. There forecasts aren’t even accurate for the NW
@ed w: ever since yer one in Salthill became a ‘star’ they all want to get into the act
@ed w: It is all designed to whip up fear and anxiety among the populace. It’s a clever ploy by the enviro-extremists.
@William Bright: eh?
@ed w: he’s entirely right. Far from protecting people they’re hyperbole is already resulting in people completely ignoring forecasts. People will needlessly venture out in dangerous conditions that would otherwise heed warnings that are generally credible, unlike the rubbish met Eireann produce
@Al Coholic: their not they’re
@Róisín Daly: think about it, more people will be likely to recall “Storm Fionn last January” as opposed the reality which is “that strong bitta wind we had that Tuesday last January”. This feeds into the “climate change” hysteria and scaremongering being utilised by enviro-extremists.
@Sandra O’Fucáif: it’s ok to be odd when you are also correct. Odd & Correct is good.
@William Bright: not another one of your ridiculous troll comments. Put your tinfoil hat back on.
@ed w: It makes it very hard to know if action is needed.
There’s also a problem with calling out warnings for big, west coast counties. Tuesday’s winds were given an orange warning for Cork, but that was largely based on the wind speeds in Beara and Mizen. In the city, it may have warranted a Yellow, while in North Cork, there was probably no need for a warning.
The same can be said for Kerry, Mayo and Galway, where severe weather next to the Atlantic can sometimes just be a bit breezy in the east of the counties.
@JimmyMc: who? Herself with the “banjo- cleaner” gob??
@Al Coholic: yeah lads im sure the tree my wife drove into on the killcullen road last night going to work was scare mongering. Must have been an evil ploy by metErin running around pushing over bins and felling trees
@ChuckE: hundreds of thousands or more of road trips and a tree blows down..quick run for the bunker.
@ed w: no he’s wrong it was very windy I’ve seen less be named storms… He’s an idiot
@William Bright: if you live in the west of lreland if might have been a bit worse than on than on the east side of lreland? No? Sandra is right you come up with whoppers.
Nobody…nobody disses Met Eireann except us. It’s OUR Met Eireann.
I remember when the Irish met office predicted a storm in the UK some years ago, the UK met office never seen it coming and many of their citizens were seriously injured, but I’m sure that never made the news over there, selective.
@Jack McGuire: little britain
@Jack. I was here when the 87 storm was building and told to get back to the UK. Drove all day and got back there and nobody knew anything about it. Then there was the Michael Fish forecast. Then my house got blown to bits. It seems the met here were on the case.
@Patrick J. O’Rourke: tail-end of Hurricane Charlie, 3 million trees downed in Britain
@Patrick J. O’Rourke: Remember the Fastnet disaster, MetEireann forecast that correctly too but unfortunately the crews of the boats were tuned into the BBC.
Looking at it logically Fionn had potential to do damage but it didn’t. They where tracking a Georgina for the past few days and that’s what hit last night. Two completely different fronts.
Thisw ould have being Georgina didn’t power up as expected until it crossed the UK. It now has red alerts in much of mainland Europe leaving people dead in Holland.
Met Eireann have done a brilliant job this winter. A few tweaks to the warning system have being made, most notably instead of issuing countywide warnings they are saying West Cavan or North Monaghan which we have seen today.
I live in Virginia, I prepare for warnings both for Cavan and Meath as weather does not recognise boundaries.
Just because the forecasted weather does not come at your back door does not mean warnings are pointless. During Ophelia 4 trees fell on the N3. Between 2-4 in the afternoon when the road is mental busy with school children being picked up…. Then you had people moaning about the red warning….
@phil: actually the storm that passed through last night was really bad in the Dublin Area with wind gusts in excess of 50 kts recorded at both Dublin Airport and Casement – and there was flight disruption at Dublin Airport – around 1am it was as noisy as Ophelia outdoors – and I am 110% in agreement with the weather warning and Met Eireann,…. just because someone’s trampoline was not blown away this time does not mean that lives were not saved by the warnings… whether is be on inland waterways or at sea or with flood preparations closing barn doors or slippy and icy roads – the warning are really useful even if the storm naming is not to everyone’s liking it does add a focus point
The real issue is that trying to measure the affects of the warning is more or less impossible as the success is based on nothing bad happening…. the real success is in fact that people are moaning that “nothing happened”.
Met Éireann got it RIGHT!!
The wind and rain caused Havoc in parts of Kerry- the virtual rivers flowing across the road where I live were worse than I’ve seen before and gusty winds made it very hazardous- on the approach to Castlemaine on a straight part of road a 4ft wide and deep pothole appeared, it was the worst I’ve ever seen and if you hit it your wheels and rims would be sugared!
I reported immediately to the Gardai & they in turn were reporting to the Council!
Again thankyou to Met Éireann for the warning, they got it smack on and the UK are talking Tosh!
@David Grey: I live in Killarney..didn’t notice anything other than typical sh*te weather
@David Grey: i agree, very bad in kerry
@Al Coholic: Put the drink down alcoholic and you’ll start to notice things going wrong around you.
@Julian Dowling: lol
@Julian Dowling: according to Twitter you are in San Diego?
@Al Coholic: Good job detective lol
I think the English guy was just pi**ed off because he couldn’t pronounce ‘Fionn’ properly….
@WJH: Anyone that can pronounce “Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch” is okay in my book.
Climate alarmists would have every minor or major weather pattern named as it feeds into their new model of environmental scaremongering.
@William Bright: once would have been enough. Still being a pain.
@William Bright: troll
@William Bright:
I agree willie……makes me a pain too, i guess.
As a resident of West Cork very close to the coast, we experienced a storm of very high and loud winds and persistent rain. Not as bad as a hurricane but a damned windy event that seemed like a storm.
@Mark Browne: been pretty wild lately..
Sour grapes – the UK should be counting it’s lucky stars if we took the brunt of the storm for them and they were less affected.
Also when you read the UK and Irish definition we use empirical measurable values and the UK use ancient pre-history estimations on whether tress will fall and stuff…
So if the speed or gusts were within the range then Met Eireann are 100% justified in naming the storm and the UK Met Office … words fail me except remember Michael Fish
Extract from Wikipedia
Met Éireann names any storm which triggers a status Orange or Red weather warning focusing on wind, The basis for such as outlined on their weather warning service are mean wind speeds in excess of 40 mph (65 km/h) or gusts over 68 mph (110 km/h).
The UK Met Office name storms that have the potential to cause medium (Amber) or high (Red) impacts to the UK. It describes the wind strength relative to observations such as “falling trees or tiles and other items like garden furniture being blown around and even a number of properties left without electrical power.”
@Niall Ó Cofaigh: Would it not be considered somewhat pointless for the UK Met Office to predict weather based on observation of damage already being caused, that’s not a forecast but merely an observation of the conditions during or after the event. A forecast should warn of the probability or potential for an impending event rather than a summary afterwards, the clue is in the word “fore”cast.
@Larry Kavanagh: not sure I get the point – both services forecast weather including wind….. according to Wikipedia the Irish criteria for naming a storm is when the forecasts indicate specific wind speeds or gusts….. the UK criteria for naming a storm is based on the potential damage that the forecast winds could cause….. the problem is that if a storm does have gusts over 110 Km/h but does not actually blow over any tree or cause any damage then the Irish criteria for naming a storm has been met but the UK one has not….
Storms are named in advance when the forecast meets certain criteria – maybe this was not clear in what I wrote or in the extract from Wikipedia – there is no suggestion of naming storms after an event based upon damage – but the UK name storms on their forecast potential to cause damage and they would not have named this one – one of the forecaster thinks
Fight fight fight
There’s nothing more dangerous than an angry meteorologist. They’re ruthless.
So this is about who names a storm first, the British can get their nose out of joint because they think the world revolves around them?
Stopped reading at ‘took to Twitter ‘.
No need to batten down the hatches, it will soon blow over.
…in a teacup.
Met Éireann is a first rate weather service led and staffed by world class physicists and meteorologists of whom Evelyn Cusack is an excellent example. Her forecasts go far beyond the call of duty, often out to eight days, and with a great deal of scientific explanation as well. Well done Met Éireann, worth every euro of public money, and a great public service.
Sharing storm names with the Brits was always going to be a bad idea. They are too arrogant for something like that..
@munsterman: Brexit shows how arrogant some of them really are?
We need to be careful, this whole situation could set Anglo-Irish relations back 100′s of years.
I was in shock last night.storm Fionn tossed my hair.
Just watched Channel 4 news. U.K. got bettered in the (Fionn) Storm last night. Red faces all around…
All these names and different colour warnings is going to cause problems down the line in my opinion.
I’m already starting to taking each warning as an exaggeration. It’s only a matter of time before we all start to take them less seriously. Already people are here saying ‘another yellow, another orange…’
Boy who cried wolf scenario on the horizon.
Gael Force Freddy’s gonna blow yer bins over this weekend. Be warned.
Name the next one storm Bayeux,that’ll cheer em up.
Whats worse is the fact if met eireann hadnt named it and not warned people and someone died the usual hysteria of not been warned would be applied so its a if you and if ya dont situation
We had stormy weather here in Ireland so who gives a crap what Liam Dutton says or said.
It’s all a storm in a tea cup.
Fear, fear, fear and it’s all our fault that the planet is f***ed. Shame and guilt is the order of the day and it’s replacing organised religion as a mechanism of control.
@Derek Durkin: no Derek it’s a storm which we had a few this winter in all fairness but if you want to be in denial about how far up poop creek we (collectively as in world population) are about acidification of the sea, melting ice caps never mind more frequent storms/ flooding drought etc. Things need to change how we spend our money how government spend our money. Look up how bees are fairing if we lose them we are up that creek…..
@Derek Durkin: When you dissolve CO2 with water, it becomes carbonic acid. The acidity of the sea has increased by 30% since 1980, which is detrimental to coral reefs and other marine life. The cause of the increase is because the oceans attempt to absorb 30-40% of atmospheric CO2. It’s the Earth’s attempt to self regulate the 40 billion tonnes of CO2 we humans pump into the atmosphere each year (and rising). But what we thought was a limitless resource, is now becoming saturated. We should be concerned and ashamed. Or do you want to wait until you witness the sea actually fizzing before you accept the evidence? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification
@Paraic McDonagh: The ph of the oceans ranges between 7.5 and 8.1 at present…It was not 30% lower in 1980….
@John003: It was a typo. Was supposed to say 1880.
Remember that scene in Anchorman…they should all get together and have a scrap
Storm in a teacup
Meanwhile in the UK
Ooops!
Eddie Hern should get involved
Yeah rte and meteorological service are sometimes a bit over the top and a bit too precious at times. Sometimes they get in a stew and nothing happens and other times didn’t see it coming. It’s not the easiest though on the West of Europe. But giving too many warnings diminish their effect….
I saw bigger blow ups between Sir Alex and Wenger
Well done Met Eireann. Just keep giving them storms Irish names, that’ll really piss them off!
Stupid weather.
The thing about weather is its unpredictable.Its an educated guess.But if there is a possibility of weather causeing harm we should be forewarned.And to the ignorant weather and climate are distinctly different….look it up.And the media should not headline and sensationalize a possible storm.But report it in a factual manor.
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