UK Met office predicts 15% chance of heavy rain. Britain gets “biblical floods”.

UK Met Office in December predicted a 15% chance of Jan-Feb-March being the wettest category. Instead the UK got “Biblical floods”.

The Prediction

SUMMARY – PRECIPITATION:

Latest predictions for UK-precipitation show a slight signal for near or just above average rainfall during January-February-March as a whole. The probability that UK precipitation for January-February-March will fall into the driest of our five categories is around 20% and the probability that it will fall into the wettest category is between 10 and 15% (the 1981-2010 probability for each of these categories is 20%).

The flooding continues:

[RT] England’s largest river, the Thames, has burst its banks, devastating homes in the southeast in the worst floods in 50 years. PM David Cameron has called the flooding “biblical,” as economists predict the crisis will cost close on $1 billion. The latest bout of rainfall caused the Thames River to swell and burst its banks, forcing people in Berkshire and Surrey from their homes. On Monday evening Surrey Police issued a statement saying that over 150 people had been rescued from their flooded homes. So far about 5,000 homes across the country have been flooded and some have remained under water for over a month as the government struggles to bring the situation under control.

The UK Met Office has described the period of rainfall the country has experienced as “the most exceptional in 248 years.” “We have records going back to 1766 and we have nothing like this. We have seen some exceptional weather. We can’t say it is unprecedented, but it is exceptional,” said the Met Office’s chief scientist, Julia Slingo, speaking ahead of the publication of its report.

The UK Met Office response — blame it on climate change:

Climate change is behind the storms that have struck Britain this winter, according to the Met Office.

Dame Julia Slingo, the Met Office’s chief scientist, said while there was not yet “definitive” proof, “all the evidence” supported the theory that climate change had played a role.

She warned that the country should prepare for similar events in future. What evidence showed that climate change was to blame? Evidence from climate models based on the same principles that didn’t predict the rain?* Climate models chop up the Earth into individual cells, then they predict the weather in each cell and add up all the mistakes cells. They will tell us that weather is not climate, but they don’t tell us how adding up a bunch of bad predictions can ever produce a good one. The weather-is-not-climate excuse is a fail. The Met Office can’t predict either beyond a week or two. The religion is unfalsifiable If the rain had been average they would have said their models “worked”. But if it turns out to be a drought or a flood, they call it an extreme weather due to “Climate change”. As long as journalists are too stupid to question this, the witchdoctors at the Met Office can’t lose. Blame the journalists — if British newspapers mocked the Met Office mercilessly (as they deserve), the Met Office would lift their game. The media IS the problem. Forecast? Some areas will get worse before they get better.

Photo: Chris Murray via BBC Stornoway Feb 1.

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*Edited to change “same models” to “same principles” for clarity. <http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/modelling-systems/unified-model/climate-models/explained>The UK Met Office</a> describes the models as being “the same family” because they are built from the same underlying bases. They are based on the same principles (and the same misunderstandings). For example, none of the climate models include things like solar magnetic or potential lunar effects on atmospheric standing waves. What matters is that none of these models work. h/t to Will Browne and Tom.

UPDATE: Link to Met OFfice Prediction PDF fixed.

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