Over the past few days I have been helping a friend  of mine in developing an interesting web application for the South African Weather Radar which is provided by the SAWS, another weather enthusiast. While none of this would be possible without the SAWS radar we did feel that there were some issues which are not covered with the current radar data, namely:

And since Andrew MacPherson has development skills and I have the weather knowledge we built ASH (Animated Static and Historical Radar Information), you can view it at:

weather.punks.co.za/weather/

This is a temporary testing URL and will be changed soon after the testing is done.

Currently it only provides information on the IR50 radar - the radar we are currently working off, just as a proof of concept and maybe when i have more time and resources I will complete it for other radars ( presuming the response is good and people are interested in it )

One issue Andrew is having,  that he hopes the community can help with is getting an exact 100km by 100km block around the IR50 radar, GPS co-ordinates: 25.9051S, 28.2035E -- from metsys.weathersa.co.za/nwrn.htm , he need this image for the background which he overlay the radar.

We both look forward to any feedback or suggestions you may have for us.

Developer: Andrew MacPherson ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it )

Assistant Designer: Bryn De Kocks ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it )

Most people are unaware but the South African Weather Service and begun the installation of numerous doppler radar weather systems throughout the country, word has it the new radar systems will replace the current radars in time and while some may shrug it off, the installation of these new doppler weather radars is a huge step forward for the meteorological society in South Africa. Doppler radar is far more helpful to storm chasers and is far more accurate in the early prediction of severe storms which show signs of development.

The current radar station which has been active for the past few days though is still in it's testing phase is located in Pretoria, these radars are fairly large in size as can be seen by the image in the top right. I am definitely looking forward to the public release of the doppler radar information as it is a needed tool in meteorology which has been lacking in South Africa for quite some time.

From wikipedia:

Doppler radar is radar that makes use of the doppler effect to produce data about objects at a distance. It does this by beaming a microwave signal towards a desired target and listening for its reflection, then analyzing how the original signal has been altered by the object(s) that reflected it. Variations in the frequency of the signal give direct and highly accurate measurements of a target's velocity relative to the radar source and the direction of the microwave beam. Doppler radars are used in air defense, air traffic control, sounding satellites, police speed guns^[1], and radiology.

The specific term "Doppler Radar", due in part to its extremely common use by television meteorologists in on-air weather reporting, has erroneously become popularly synonymous with the type of radar used in meteorology. Most modern weather radars use the pulse-doppler technique to examine the motion of precipitation, but it is only a part of the processing of their data. So, while these radars use a highly specialized form of doppler radar, the term is much broader in its meaning and its applications.

For more information read - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doppler_radar

So yesterday there was a hoax email that made it's rounds through thousands of peoples inboxes it seems and from that found it's way onto the radio where some radio DJs were also fooled by the hoax and spread the hoax on the air and only created more hype around this event. The truth is that there were strong winds and heavy rains present but none of this was due to tropical cyclones.

For future referrence let's look at the facts.

Firstly should a cyclone be threatening the coast of South Africa, it would be talked about for 3-5 days ahead of time, tropical cyclones don't just pop out of nowhere. The South African Weather Service would issue warnings and a press release ahead of time, not on the same day.

Secondly, the occurance of tropical cyclones hitting South Africa is rare and while it has occured in the past, there have been more hoaxes about tropical cyclones hitting the country than the country has actually even experienced- a media source earlier this year claimed a Cape Town storm was a hurricane. Sadly misinformation is spread through bad journalism often.

Thirdly, should there be a weather threat you are guaranteed to hear about it from a real weather source like the South African Weather Service, not some random site with no credibility. As far as I know the referrence to the site in the hoax email wasn't even a valid site.

Lastly, if one reads about a specific extreme weather event about to occur- I suggest checking the forums on the site rather or the SAWS as we tend to be on top of any extreme conditions that threaten S.A and a cyclone would definitely be up there.

And as a word of advice, one should learn about the facts of severe weather to help make educated decisions on what conditions are real and what are not. Straight off the bat this was clearly a hoax for one easy reason- the tropical cyclone season has just started for this year and cyclone naming is alphabetical and there would have needed to be 17 previous tropical cyclones this year for a cyclone to be named an 'R' name if I recall correctly the hoax was about cyclone Roberta. 

Okay, so tomorrow is the big day- I get aboard a plane headed to Johannesburg tomorrow night where I will be picked up and then taken to Pretoria for my 2 week stay, I will return to Cape Town on the 30th November. I will be chasing on the days that look promising and hopefully be able to get some good media documentation of the storms.

Forecast Conditions

Currently the forecast conditions are a bit of a mystery to me, while I am aware of what conditions are needed here in Cape Town for strong thunderstorms and which condition means what, I am not sure of what to expect in Johannesburg. I am aware of the afternoon convection and the general increase in CAPE and LI during the day. But when it comes to messy conditions I am not sure what to expect.

Thursday: Thursday there are thundershowers possible but with the low temperatures I am thinking this will be one of those 'messy' days without isolated storm structures, that are good for photography.

Friday: This is the big day in the near future according to the South African Weather Service, they have issued warnings of heavy rainfalls and strong surface winds, These conditions are due to a cut-off low being situated over the northern cape at the time. They are predicting 113mm of rain in a period of 24 hours, which would cause flooding if it were to occur. They are also forecasting thunderstorms for this day, though again I am not sure of the nature of these conditions, will they be isolated thunderstorms or is it just going to be a dull dark day with some rumbles of thunder? We will see.

Saturday and Sunday: Saturday has showers forecast and generally looks boring through the SAWS. Sunday temperatures will begin to recover which will hopefully lead to an increase in convection potential in the beginning of the week.

I will try to keep the site updated fairly often as to the happenings of my adventure, though the big updates of videos and photos will likely happen when I return. Keep an eye on the forums though as I will likely be posting quite frequently.