Hi folks
Those of you who are interested in the weather will have experienced the
hassles of decoding the the locations used for trough lines and such in
the otherwise excellent Area Briefings from the met office and Air
Services. For example, today's area 41 briefing includes the following...
OVERVIEW:
ISOLATED SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS E YLRE/BRR.
WIND:
2000 5000 7000 10000 14000 18500
VRB/10 090/10 VRB/10 VRB/10 MS01 VRB/10 MS06 240/15 MS15
AMD CLOUD:
ISOL CB 6500/20000 E YAPH/YGDA TILL 11Z
SCT ST 1500/3000 IN PRECIPITATION
BKN CU/SC 5000/15000 E YMNY/YJAK
Now, whilst you might remember after a couple of lookings up in ERSA
that YLRE is Longreach aerodrome, you still then need to find that on a
map to work out what's going on (although for Longreach, I suspect that
most of us have some idea where that is)! As for BRR, I have no idea
what that is (it turns out that it's Barringun LDM, right on the NSW/Qld
Border on the road between Bourke and Cunnamulla) - and the others
(well, at least they are ICAO airfield codes)??? You might think that
YJAK was Jackson, and you'd be right - except it's not the Jackson
between Miles and Yuleba that we in SE Qld know - but out south west of
Quilpie! So, even when you have a name from the code things are still
difficult. ERSA does give the lat/long of the points - but only in the
ENCODE section, so once you have decoded something, you then have to
look up in the ENCODE section to get a lat/long to find it on a map.
All of this makes life a bit more than just a pain in the ass for us
casual met briefing users and I suspect that regular users are still
regularly stumped by what a code is and where it is...
Modern technology to the rescue!
With some initial assistance, I have been able to create a Google Earth
file (VFR_Codes.kml) that plots these points on Google Earth. You can
find this on my website at
http://www.hart.wattle.id.au/alice/gliding/index.html
If you load this into Google Earth, you will find an alphabetical
listing of all these codes and clicking on any of these codes makes it
visible to you on Google Earth.
Please note *I do not guarantee the accuracy of the information in this
file, so use it or otherwise at your own discretion.*
Hope this is of use to people - now I must really get back to some
study, which is what I'm supposed to be doing today!!!
--
Robert Hart [EMAIL PROTECTED]
+61 (0)438 385 533 http://www.hart.wattle.id.au
--
Robert Hart [EMAIL PROTECTED]
+61 (0)438 385 533 http://www.hart.wattle.id.au
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