Episode 132 | Satellite Messenger Weather Forecasts

on an inreach, if you send “wxnow” to wx2inreach@gmail.com it will send back a message with the weather for the next week

it must use the noaa forecast.  for the location you sent the message from

I have it set as one of my presets so I only have to pay for the return message with the weather

Thanks! This is one of the most informative podcasts for me. I’ve always suspected that’s kinda sorta how they worked, but glad to know the details. (I use an inReach frequently in the backcountry, where I’m not only far from cell coverage but far from any weather stations at all.)

Thanks Phil!

wx2inreach (“wxnow”) uses NWS data, which for point-forecasts, should offer terrain-adjusted accuracy. Probably not as statistically comprehensive as meteoblue, but likely reasonable.

Another option is mgrey, which like wx2inreach also offers some unique instructions you can send with your message to request a more tailored forecast, and for those of you in Scandinavia, accesses weather data from MET.

I was on a trip where wxnow said there was a 30% chance of rain on each of Tuesday night, Wednesday, and Wednesday night.

What actually happened was steady rain Tuesday night and Wednesday, early Wednesday night it stopped raining   quite a bit worse than the forecast.

On the other hand, it didn’t rain all the days the forecast said there was 0% or 10% chance of rain.

The forecast is useful but not perfect.

There’s a similar error for Max and min temp.

Jerry – there’s a lot of misunderstanding about what that 30% actually means, I discussed this briefly in the podcast episode:

• A 30% chance of rain means that, based on the forecast model, there is a 30% probability that measurable precipitation (usually ≥0.01 in / 0.25 mm) will occur at your location during that forecast period.
• It does not mean “30% of the area will get rain” or “it will rain for 30% of the time.” It is specifically about the probability of occurrence at the given place and time window.

So in this context: was the forecast actually accurate?

I’d argue that the inacurracy of the forecast was that it actually rained on Wed morning, and the forecast (I assume) was 0% rain on Wednesday during the day.

Yeah, that’s my understanding.

There’s a 30% chance of measureable rain on each of of Tuesday night, Wednesday, and Wednesday night.

Actually, there was measureable rain on each of those three periods.

I have no problem with that innaccuracy, that’s just how good we are at predicting.

When i look with my PC, it also says how many inches of precip are predicted, that’s even more useful.

During the day, if it rains less than 0.1 inch, then it doesn’t much matter.

During the night, if it’s more than about 0.01 inch I’ll put my tent up.  So the percent chance of measureable rain is probably just what I want

Thanks for this incredibly informative episode. I’ve been using an InReach since 2015 (back when it was owned by DeLorme) and I’ve never heard a more detailed description of how these forecasts work. There have been a couple of times pulling a weather report on a trip changed our plans, and now I know more about how to read the forecasts from my InReach.