ABSTRACT
Not a year goes by without weather events somewhere in the world causing damage or loss of life. Floods, gales, blizzards, tornadoes, hurricanes and even heatwaves can create problems and generate much economic stress over the areas affected. To be prepared, it is vital to understand the weather, and be able to predict with accuracy, preferably well in advance, events such as these. It is important too that we understand not only the vagaries of day-to-day weather conditions but also longer-term trends. How useful it would be for farmers to know what the weather over the next few weeks or even the whole growing season will be like; they could plan which crop would be most suitable and alter sowing, ploughing or harvesting far more successfully. How useful it would be to have a clear idea of the weather in the year ahead so that cereal harvests could be predicted, plans for winter frost and snows could be made and measures could be taken to deal with drought. Any such detailed understanding is a long way away. It may come as we gather more knowledge about the medium-term processes operating within the atmosphere, and about the myriad factors that influence those processes. However, many scientists doubt whether it will ever be possible to predict in any detail the long-term movements of a chaotic and turbulent ‘fluid’ such as our atmosphere.
