Happy World Meteorological Day!

Saturday 23 March is World Meteorological Day 2019 and this year the World Meteorological Organisation has named the theme – ‘The Sun, the Earth and the Weather’. In the Scottish Flood Forecasting Service (SFFS) the weather services are provided by the Met Office, with hydrology provided by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), so today is a good day to highlight this partnership.

The SFFS has been going since 2011. From the start it has been a working partnership between SEPA and the Met Office. Operationally we work together to produce the daily Flood Guidance Statement, and provide forecast information to aid with the issuing of Flood Alerts and Warnings by SEPA. Additionally, the partnership is active in flood forecasting research, and facilitates the exchange of data between the organisations, as well as in training, development and public awareness of flood risk.

The railway line at Saltcoats in Ayrshire is lashed by the effects of Storm Callum in October. Flood Warnings were in force for this coast. Photo from BBC News.

Over the past year we have issued a Flood Guidance Statement every day, 54 of which have shown heightened flood risk. SEPA has also issued 215 Flood Alerts and 200 Flood Warnings in Scotland during this period, all of which required accurate meteorological input.

The work of the service, as highlighted in all the earlier articles on this site , would be impossible without the high quality meteorological data and expert advice produced continuously every day by the Met Office. For more information on recent weather and the science and history of meteorology, see the podcasts at this link.