What weather fax brodcasts are you using?

[dylan]

Hi All,
I'm doing the Pac Cup on Moonshine (SSS Trans next time) and was curious to which weather fax broadcast most people use. Do you receive and use the transmissions from Pt Reyes or Hawaii?

If you're also using gribs for predictions do you bother with the predictions available via fax?

Do you guys use the surface analysis, wind/wave analysis, and 500 mb?

Any suggestions?

Thanks
Dylan
SV Moonshine

 

[Alchera]

When I download faxes, I will generally try to get the surface analysis and the wind/wave predictions. I don't bother with the 500mb. My feeling is that someone much more talented than I has already looked at that in order to do the wind/wave predictions, so I'm not likely to do better. Sometimes I'll grab the satellite photo if I can to get a sense of what is really happening. Pt Reyes is generally where I get them from.

Nowdays though I primarily use grib files, so I only tend to download weatherfaxes every so often just to doublecheck in case the gribs look a little vague on something.

- Mark

 

[Paul Elliott]

Starting out you will probably get the best signal from Pt Reyes. As you sail towards Hawaii, you will likely find that the best receive frequency will change, and at some point (depending on the time of day) the Honolulu broadcast will be the better one. Make sure you have the list of all the latest times and frequencies. If you are using "GetFax", look at the automation file -- quite convenient.

I've been using satphone for my wx data, but before that I got gribs from SailMail SSB, and the surface pressure wfax (0, 24, 48, 96, and 24-hr wind/wave) from the Pt. Reyes or Honolulu broadcast.

Note that the grib may not show a tropical depression until it gets pretty big. At a minimum you probably want to get the text forecast or a surface pressure wfax to see if there are any warnings.

 

[AlanH]

Note that the grib may not show a tropical depression until it gets pretty big. At a minimum you probably want to get the text forecast or a surface pressure wfax to see if there are any warnings.

Suggestions.....the more specific, the better.....on how to get the NOAA text forecasts from the North Pacific?

 

[AlanH]

Suggestions.....the more specific, the better.....on how to get the NOAA text forecasts from the North Pacific?

ah, I found a lot of information on requesting text weather forecasts by e-mail, on the Saildocs website....

http://www.saildocs.com/info

Read that page. Send an e-mail message to "[email protected]"

with the body of the message being

send info
send index

You'll get a mess of information to review. I found it helpful to read it all so that I could figure out what was going on. You'll see that for this race, you'll want information on the East Pacific, so you'll send query@saildocs another message

send nws-epac

THAT gets you a catalog of the different regions covered by text forecasts, sorted by region and lat and long.

The response you'll get looks like this, which shows you the specific forecasts to request.

NWS FORECAST PRODUCTS - EASTERN PACIFIC
revised 29 may 2001

HIGH SEAS FORECASTS
FZPN01.KWBC: NE Pacific (E part of FZPN02.KWBC)
FZPN02.KWBC: NE Pacific (GMDSS Area XII, N of 30N)
FZPN03.KNHC: NE PACIFIC Equator to 30N, E of 140W (part of FZPN02.KWBC)
FZPN04.KNHC: SE PACIFIC Equator to 18.5S, E of 120W (GMDSS Area XVI)

FZPN40.PHFO: N PACIFIC Equator to 30N, between 140W and 160E.
FZPS40.PHFO: S PACIFIC Equator to 25S, between 120W and 160E.

OFFSHORE MARINE FORECASTS
FZPN25.KWBC: Washington, Oregon
FZPN26.KWBC: California
FZPN01.PANC: Alaska

COASTAL FORECASTS
FZUS56.KSEW: Seattle, WA
FZUS56.KPQR: Portland, OR
FZUS56.KMFR: Medford, OR
FZUS56.KEKA: Eureka, CA
FZUS56.KMTR: San Francisco, CA
FZUS56.KLOX: Los Angeles, CA
FZUS56.KSGX: San Diego, CA
FZMY50.PGUM: Marianas (Guam)
FZPQ50.PGUM: Micronesia

pzz081: Cape Flattery to Cape Lookout
pzz082: Cape Lookout to Point St. George
pzz083: Point St. George to Point Arena
pzz084: Point Arena to Point Conception
pzz085: Point Conception to Guadalupe Island

HAWAIIAN WATERS
phz180: Hawaii Waters
phz130: Hawaii Channel Waters
phz150: Coastal Island Waters

OTHER TEXT PRODUCTS
ck2: West Coast & Alaska Tsunami bulletin
ck3: Pacific Tsunami bulletin

;Coastal flood warnings
FZUS68.KSEA: Seattle, WA
FZUS68.KPDX: Portland, OR
FZUS68.KMFR: Medford, OR
FZUS68.KEKA: Eureka, CA
FZUS68.KSFO: San Francisco, CA
FZUS68.KLAX: Los Angeles, CA
FZUS68.KSAN: San Diego, CA

=====
Thanks for using Saildocs, an Internet document retrieval
service for the bandwidth-imaired.

Saildocs is provided without charge thanks to the support of Sailmail,
a membership-owned radio email service for cruising sailors which
operates a seamless network of 13 stations world-wide (including
five covering the Caribean and Atlantic). For more information on
SailMail see the web page at www.sailmail.com or send a query to
the office at [email protected].

More information on Saildocs is available by sending an email to
[email protected], this will return the how-to document (about 5K).

 

[dylan]

Thank you to all that replied. I feel pretty comfortable with which faxes would be useful for the trip.

Is everyone just using their SSB and laptop for the faxes or are you bringing an old furuno too? I can see some gain in having the prints available without having to turn the laptop on every time you want to review a fax. We're on a 26 foot boat and don't plan on turning the laptop on all that much.

Anyone using seatty for the faxes? Seems like a reasonable program.

Alan-did you get my PM?

Dylan