scottd
Pre-takeoff checklist
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Well, the TAF is re-issued every six hours, so honestly, I'm not sure it would really help most of us.
Since the same folks who do ORD also do DPA, MDW, and RFD, why aren't those listed? They are usually very similar!Not a single airport on that list I fly to.
I want a user fee exemption.
So when you get up the next morning
do you ignore the updated TAFs? No, I don't wait up to see the next TAFs, but I do check them in the morning and it will have covered the extra six hours you are looking for. That extra six hours on the end of these new TAFs doesn't really factor into the picture in my opinion.
What you see on the web site you referenced is called Model Output Statistics (MOS) which is untouched by human hands. I helped build the MOS for the Nested Grid Model (NGM) many years ago. Forecasters at the local weather forecast office incorporate MOS along with several other forecast products to construct the TAFs. At a range of 24 hours and longer, there's a lot of room for error. The forecasters at the WFO normally can do a pretty good job knowing when the MOS is on the money and when it is not.
FWIW, a TAF is the most difficult forecast any meteorologist must make. You are basically asking them to make a forecast for an area the size of your neighborhood using numerical guidance (weather prediction models) that have a resolution twice the size of the terminal area. Moreover, they are predicting elements on an hour-by-hour basis where the guidance is typically provided every three to six hours into the future. Forecasting this information out to 30 hours is insane, IMHO.
Of all the forecast products, TAFs seem the most consistently close to what will happen, IMHO.
Or am I deluded?