Online Book: Weather Reception and Analysis

Many experienced voyagers rave about the benefits of understanding how the upper level (500-mb) charts influence future weather, but how can we gain that understanding with a reasonable amount of effort? John has built a study guide that will do just that in about 10 hours.

With modern weather reception and analysis tools we can plan our cruises and voyages as much as two weeks ahead. John shares how.

Most discussions about weather reception and analysis in the cruising community end up focused on the tools and technology. But that’s not what matters. In fact, planning fun and safe cruises is all about how we USE the tools and THINK about weather. That’s just what this chapter, based on some 25 years of real cruising experience, is about.

There are so many weather reception and analysis tools out there, all claiming to be the best. But which ones really work? John has been testing a bunch of them all summer on a real cruise to challenging places and tells all.

What if we could plan our cruises around the weather for as much as two weeks into the future, even without internet? Well, now we can.

So you bought a satellite phone or Iridium GO! to get email and weather information while at sea. But what software is best to use with it? John has the answer based on some 15 years of real world experience.

The whole process of buying, installing and working with a satellite phone can be downright intimidating and very frustrating. John explains how to make the whole process easy. The results of 15 years of experience with Iridium devices.

Few pieces of new gear have created more buzz in the offshore cruising community than the Iridium GO!. And there have also been few pieces of gear that have been surrounded with as many myths and as much confusion as the GO!.

John busts the myths and analyzes the benefits of buying an Iridium GO!.

We got our hands on a real live professional meteorologist, who is also an offshore sailor, and wrung 4 great tips out of him that will make your voyages both safer and more comfortable.

There’s a lot of great weather information out there these days…and a lot of hype too. Here are some tips that will help you tell the difference and decide what’s worth spending your money on.

In the last chapter I explained how to receive text forecasts while offshore. Now I want to share one of my favourite forecasts, that I suspect very few people know about or bother to get.

In this chapter I’m going to write about how we receive voice (well, not really voice, per se) and text forecasts while at sea and in remote places.

In this chapter I’m going to get into the details of how we request and use GRIBs to get the maximum amount of information for the minimum data size and cost, when at sea or in remote areas with no internet.

Starting with this chapter I’m going to focus on weather reception tools that we use when we are offshore or in remote places where the internet is not available. Let’s start with weatherfax and why it’s still important.