Alternatively you could go to your local Airservices' map reseller
and buy a copy of the current PCA (Planning Chart Australia) which
shows the locations and the Area Forecast boundaries. You can carry
them around more easily than Robert's Google Earth map too - even on
the cockpit if you want.
It does take a little experience to realise that YCBA is Cobar, YCBR
is Collarenebri (Canberra is YSCB "of course"!), YGDA is Goodooga and
YGDI is Goondiwindi, YTAM is Taroom and Tamworth is YSTW - and local
knowledge to know where they are, but if you read the forecasts
regularly you will get used to the common ones that are on the
boundaries of weather systems, or are critical locations for weather
to affect flight paths. The Forecast Area boundaries are logical in
terms of weather systems - and anyway the exact locations of trough
lines are notoriously hard to predict as they move around like a
shopping trolley!!
Mind you, I still fail to see why the on-line Briefings include
cyclone warnings in WA or the location of HMAS Canberra (moored off
Perth somewhere) against Area 21 and 22 in southern and SW NSW!
Wombat
At 19:01 12/05/2008, you wrote:
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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