From 'Arctic gales' to 'scorching sunshine'...

Express, Monday 29 April 2013:

Any hopes of a reprieve for the Bank Holiday were dashed as experts warned wind, rain and bitter temperatures will dampen spirits for much of the UK...

There is even the chance of snow over the hills in the North with everywhere on alert for widespread frosts.

Express, Saturday 4 May 2013:

Britain will be hotter than Bondi Beach as families flock to the coast this Bank Holiday weekend.

'Yesterday'

A quick mention for something that has already been covered on The Media Blog.

The front page of the Express on 12 January looked like this:

Under the image, the caption reads:

A snowplough battles through the blizzards battering the M6 in Cumbria yesterday.

Yesterday? That's odd, given that the Express used the very same photo on 7 December 2012.

Given the paper's penchant for over-the-top, worst-case-scenario weather headlines, this may not have been an accident.

But if it was, it follows other recent photo errors such as the Czech soldiers it said were British, and the Dutch Olympians it said were British.

(Hat-tip to DailyExpressLOL)

Another 'sour' post about the weather predictions in the Express

Express hack Nathan Rao appears not to have enjoyed this post about his not-very-reliable articles about the weather.

Despite claiming it made him 'chuckle' he took to his personal blog to label it 'sour', 'yawn-inducing' and 'pointless drivel'.

Well, if anyone knows pointless drivel when he sees it...

The 'yawn-inducing' insult is curious, too, given he's been following Tabloid Watch on Twitter since 6 November 2011.

Apart from those insults, Rao had nothing to say about the post. He didn't challenge or debunk it in any way - he just indulged in petty name-calling.

Twenty-eight people decided to post comments in response to Rao's outburst - every one is critical of him and challenging him to point out where this blog was wrong. He hasn't responded on his blog, but tweeted:

Chuckling at how many people have so much to say that they are unwilling to put their names to. Carry on chaps.

So let's look at Nathan's articles about the possibility of a White Christmas in 2012. 

On 21 November, the Express said:

Nathan explained:

Britain is on course for a White Christmas with snow likely as far south as London, say forecasters.

And:

Much of Britain can expect its snowiest winter for 100 years, according to James Madden, forecaster for Exacta Weather.

On 7 December, Nathan went further - a White Christmas was not just 'odds-on' but a 'dead cert'.

Less than a week later, the prediction changed to a 'wet Christmas'.

By 22 December, the Express had decided Christmas Day 'won't be a white-out' and on the big day, the paper reported:

Hopes of a white Christmas have been washed out

And the Met Office's verdict on Boxing Day about a White Christmas?

Some 'dead cert'.

And yet another blemish on the record of - ahem - 'unmatched' and 'accurate weather updates' from Rao and the Express.

The Express and its 'unmatched, accurate weather updates'

In today's Express, the paper pats itself on the back for its weather coverage. The paper says it has:

a firm reputation for leading the way when it comes to the weather.

That:

we are unmatched on our faithful and accurate weather updates.

And that they are:

oracles of the British weather.

This article was written by Nathan Rao. Many of the Express' weather articles, which often predict apocalyptic spells of cold or heat (usually, one appears days after the other), are also written by Nathan Rao.

For example, on 5 September he wrote about a:

tropical burst of summer could last late into October

It didn't last until late October - it didn't even last five days, as on 10 September Rao was reporting 80mph gales that would 'end [the] heatwave.'

On 7 July, the paper (not Rao this time) claimed: Sorry, there's no might about it...IT WILL RAIN 'TIL SEPTEMBER. Just two weeks later, Rao claimed that Britain would see 'temperatures soaring to 95F next week.'

On 15 June, Rao's story claiming that forecasters did 'not anticipate any significant hot spell until well into September' was splashed on the front page. Ten days later, Rao's story claiming that a 'scorching blast of summer will at last roar in from the Continent this week – sending temperatures to 93F (34C)' was splashed on the front page.

On 22 May, the Express said it would be the 'hottest summer for almost a decade'. On 9 June, this changed to 'worst storms for a decade' and a 'year without summer'.

On 19 April, Rao reported claims that it would be the 'coldest May for 100 years'. In fact, the Met Office revealed at the end of May:

temperature, rainfall and even sunshine are very close to normal....

And that there was:

a run of dry and fine weather, with some remarkably high temperatures. This included a new maximum May temperature for Scotland...

In all, it has been the longest warm spell in May since 1992.

A year ago, on 17 December 2011, the Express' front page headline screamed: 'It's a white Christmas!'. But just four days later, bookies were 'slashing the odds on this Christmas being the warmest on record' and two days after that, the paper admitted: 'It won't be a white Christmas anywhere in the UK'.

In early October 2011, Rao reported that temperatures were to hit -20C 'within weeks'. A month later, he reported a 'big Siberian freeze' will arrive 'with a vengeance...within the next fortnight'. Twelve days later, Rao was reporting that Britain was: 'on track for the warmest November since records began 353 years ago.'

There are many more examples like these. After all, Scott Bryan revealed on 23 August 2012 that since September 2011, the Express had weather stories on the front page 111 times - 52 of them as the main story.

So while the Express may indeed 'lead the way' in the amount of column-inches it devotes to the weather, to claim it is of 'unmatched accuracy' or that they are 'oracles of the British weather' is simply laughable.

* Nathan Rao has his own blog. It reveals he's been a journalist for nine years and includes a section called 'Some of my front pages'. It includes just six examples, all from the Express, one of which is the disgraceful, completely untrue 'Muslim Plot to Kill Pope' article which labelled six innocent men as Islamic terrorists with links to Al-Qaeda.

The Express and the weather (cont.)

Daily Express, 5 September 2012:

Summer to last until October

Britain is beginning to enjoy the longest spell of hot weather so far this year.

A glorious last-minute tropical burst of summer could last late into October, forecasters said last night.

Daily Express, 10 September 2012:

80mph gales to hit Britain

Gales of up to 80mph will batter Britain this week as a perfect storm threatens to sweep across the country.

MailOnline fooled by fake Isaac photo

MailOnline reports on the progress of Tropical Storm/Hurricane Isaac:

The first photo they use to illustrate their article is certainly dramatic. But is it genuine? And is it Isaac?

They have credited it to 'Twitter/Seven_marine'. But that Twitter account has not been updated since March 2011.

A quick search of Google Images finds that photo used on many blogs before Isaac, including this one from August 2010 and this one from 2008.

According to Bay News 9:

the photo has been around for many years and seems to pop up every time a severe weather situation arises.

"It is a Photoshopped picture of a supercell thunderstorm that seems to pop up with a new foreground every time there is a hurricane threat anywhere," Bay News 9 Meteorologist Josh Linker said.

"I've seen versions of that photo since at least 2005," Bay News 9 Meteorologist Brian McClure added.

Yet, according to the caption on 'newspaper website of the year' MailOnline, the photo is:

Ominous: Tropical storm Isaac gathers pace as it barrels towards the Gulf coast, where it is expected to hit by Wednesday - the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina

Journalist Jonathan Haynes says:

Cannot believe how many news websites see something on Twitter and publish it without basic checks on its validity. Utterly depressing. 

(Hat-tip to Jonathan Haynes).

UPDATE: MailOnline updated their article and removed the fake photo at 7.11pm, less than an hour after a link to the above was posted on Twitter. 

Express and the weather (cont.)

The Media Blog points out that the Express' fondness for passing off exaggerated and contradictory weather forecasts as front page news continues.

On 7 July, the front page headline was: Sorry, there's no might about it...IT WILL RAIN 'TIL SEPTEMBER

Then yesterday: 95F - Forget the rain, Britain's summer starts this weekend.

Express changes its weather forecast....again

This blog has tried to keep track of the very changeable weather forecasts that have appeared on the front of the Express over the past few months.

Now things have changed again. 

Just ten days ago, we were told 'Summer starts in September':

Nathan Rao explained:

Forecasters fear the equivalent of five months of rain could fall by the end of June. They do not anticipate any significant hot spell until well into September.

No significant hot spell until September?

Then today:

And now, Mr Rao?

A scorching blast of summer will at last roar in from the Continent this week – sending temperatures to 93F (34C).

Sun-starved Britons will sizzle in four days of “extreme heat” – at least in the South – due to a surge of hot air from Spain and France.

The mercury is expected to rocket to 81F tomorrow with highs of 93F possible in London and the South-east by Thursday.

34C?

The Met Office is currently forecasting nothing higher than 25C this week in London:

The Express and the weather (cont.)

True to form, the Express has published another front page headline about the weather. A month ago, they told us:

The Express now tells us:

Many of these stories have been based on forecasts from Jonathan Powell - formerly of Positive Weather Solutions but now Vantage Weather Services.

George Monbiot has more.

The coldest May for 100 years?

On 19 April, the Express' front page splash was yet another weather prediction:

The article by Nathan Rao explained:

Britain is facing the coldest May for a century with winter poised to return, bringing snow and bitter winds.

Parts of the UK are braced for the thermometer to plunge as the cool spring turns even chillier. Worst hit will be the East – although summer will be on hold across the entire country.

The story was based on a forecast from WeatherAction's Piers Corbyn:

He said: "We are making this headline public because of its importance...we last got a very cold May in 1996, but we could have to go back to 1891 to see similar. It is certainly going to be a very cold month in the East, although the West will be milder during the day."

A Met Office analysis of the weather from 1-28 May, published on the 30th, actually revealed:

temperature, rainfall and even sunshine are very close to normal....Mean temperature for 1 to 28 May is 10.1 °C, just 0.1 °C above the long-term average. Sunshine is at 104% of the average with 192 hours, so a little above what we would expect, and rainfall is just below at 90% of the average, or 59.8mm.

There was:

a run of dry and fine weather, with some remarkably high temperatures. This included a new maximum May temperature for Scotland...

In all, it has been the longest warm spell in May since 1992.

Changeable weather conditions at the Express

Daily Express, 19 May 2012:

Britain's miserable spring will end in a glorious summer, forecasters said last night.

Sun lovers can start looking forward to temperatures in the 80s by the end of June.

Daily Express, 22 May 2012: 100F SUMMER ON WAY

Daily Express, 22 May 2012:

RED-HOT SUMMER TO BREAK RECORDS

Britain is on course for the hottest summer for almost a decade, forecasters said last night.

Daily Express, 9 June 2012:

Britain faces another fortnight of torrential rain which could trigger the worst floods for almost a decade, forecasters warned last night.

A “devastating deluge” threatens to bring two months’ worth of rain before the end of what will be a washout June.

Daily Express editorial, 9 June 2012:

The weather is spectacularly terrible.

It looks as though 2012 might well turn out to be a year without a summer.

Not such a positive solution

George Monbiot's column of 26 January about Positive Weather Solutions (PWS) is well worth reading.

PWS had become favoured weather forecasters by certain tabloid newspapers - both the Mail and Express were quoting them up to a couple of weeks ago. As Monbiot wrote on 2 January:

PWS boasts that it "has made the front page of the Daily Express thirteen times; the Daily Telegraph seven times; and the Daily Mail and the Sun once". Between 26 September and 1 October, it says, it "was quoted every single day in the Daily Express".

In the earlier column, he talked about both PWS and another minor outfit, Exacta (source of the Express' '-20C to hit us in weeks' front page headline), and noted that the scorn poured on inaccurate Met Office forecasts by the tabloids was not repeated when these other forecasters got it wrong:

Unlike the Met Office, the alternative forecasters are neither roasted nor frozen out when they get it wrong. In 2010, for example, the Daily Mail announced that "the country really is on course for a barbecue summer". This time, it told its readers, the prediction "comes from a forecaster with a somewhat better record on the subject than the poor old Met Office". This was PWS – which has no published record at all. PWS told the Mail that "there will be stifling temperatures, making it possibly the warmest UK summer on record". In fact it was an unremarkable summer, but there were no "red faces" at PWS.

Yet it turned out that many of the 'staff photos' on the PWS website were stock pictures taken from elsewhere. When Monbiot asked PWS chief Jonathan Powell if he could speak to a couple of these other forecasters, Powell hesitated. Two hours later, he told Monbiot:

"Quite frankly, the filing system I have is a mess and I cannot put my hands of the information you require … Your column which was understandably critical of us at Christmas made me face a few things about the company and where it was going, and now as I can't find anything to back anyone up then quite frankly PWS is now more trouble than its worth and in debt. Therefore, I have taken the decision after six years to close the business forthwith."

These were not questions the tabloids that so favoured using PWS bothered to ask. And, for once, this is one PWS quote that the tabloids haven't bothered to repeat.

(Many thanks to Mark S)

I'm dreaming of a ...oh

Daily Express, 17 December 2011:

Daily Mail, 17 December 2011:

Bookmakers have slashed the odds on a white Christmas with temperatures set to remain below zero across much of the country in what is expected to be the coldest snap of the winter so far.

Daily Mail, 21 December 2011:

Britain enjoyed near-record temperatures on Tuesday - and Wednesday is predicted to be warmer that spring. The sudden mild spell, which is forecast to last into 2012, has led to bookies slashing the odds on this Christmas being the warmest on record.

Daily Express, 23 December 2011:

(More on the Express' weather reporting here)

(George Monbiot has written about the tabloids' forecasting for Comment in Free)

The Express and the weather

Daily Express, 8 October 2011:

By Nathan Rao:

Britain is braced for an Arctic blast which will bring record low temperatures within weeks, forecasters said last night...

Britain is likely to be hit by temperatures as low as minus 20C – perhaps even lower – and widespread heavy snow as early as the start of next month.

Daily Express, 2 November 2011:

By Nathan Rao:

Britain faces a sudden shivering end to the exceptionally warm late autumn with temperatures plunging towards Siberian levels.

Winter weather will arrive with a vengeance with temperatures well below zero within the next fortnight.

Daily Express, 14 November 2011:

Littlejohn gets it wrong (again)

In his column today, Richard Littlejohn says:

Following last year’s triumphant forecast of a ‘barbecue summer’, the Met Office is now predicting a ‘phew-what-a-scorcher’ August this year.

So expect a small tsunami. Better start stocking up on umbrellas, dinghies and galoshes, just in case.

This short piece seems to have been thrown in at the last minute, as several newspapers reported on a long-range weather forecast yesterday.

Unfortunately for Littlejohn, that forecast came from Positive Weather Solutions (PWS). Not the Met Office.

Oh, and the Met Office's infamous 'barbecue summer' forecast wasn't 'last year' but in 2009.

So that's two factual errors in one sentence.

In fact, PWS did predict summer 2010 would be a 'good time to get the barbecue out' - as reported in the Daily Mail under the headline 'BBQ summer ahead!'

Moreover, as Littlejohn might have heard, the Met Office announced last year:

We have therefore decided to stop issuing a UK 'seasonal forecast' four times a year. Instead, we will now publish a monthly outlook, updated on a weekly basis.

If he missed their press release, he could have read the news in the paper he writes for.

But the 2011 forecast was, in any case, less clear-cut than Littlejohn and others made out. Indeed, PWS issued a statement yesterday regarding the various media reports of their forecast:

On Monday, March 28th, 2011, PWS was quoted on the front of the Daily Telegraph with the headline 'A Barbeque August'. On the inside of The Sun, their headline read 'Summer Washout'. So two newspapers, with two different interpretations...

Whilst the Daily Star also followed the path of the Daily Telegraph, the only two newspapers which seemed to have the balance correct, and indeed the quotes correct, were the Daily Express and the Daily Mail, who quite rightly went along the lines of a mixed June and July, with August possibly [their emphasis] offering the best of the weather.

If you can see the word 'barbeque' in our August forecast, please let us know.

(Hat-tips to robaparis and uponnothing)

More Express weather nonsense

Last Friday's Daily Express front page relied on three familiar features - weather, scaremongering and 'chaos':


Whether the dire predictions turn out to be true or not (and if it's the Express, the likelihood is they won't) it is a very silly headline.

After all, when was the old 'Arctic chaos'?

And secondly, surely 'Arctic chaos' can only happen in the Arctic?

[UPDATE: True or not? Not]

Global warming chaos at the Express

With tiresome predictability, the weather was back on the front page of the Express today. And it's not just any old weather story - that would never do. It's got to be weather 'chaos':


But let's ignore yet another airing of the word 'chaos' (and two days ago, there was more 'taxpayers' fury' - which actually meant TaxPayers' Alliance fury) as it's worth looking at the actual story.

Although it is being quite generous to call it that.

As the sub-head makes abundantly clear, the Express is actually suggesting that because it is snowing in Britain in winter, global warming can't possibly exist.

The article, written by Martyn Brown, begins:

As one of the worst winters in 100 years grips the country, climate experts are still trying to claim the world is growing warmer.

It appears the Express does not know the difference between weather and climate. That's possibly wilful, but probably just ignorance.

Furthermoe, as George Monbiot and Leo Hickman point out in their fisking of Brown's piece:

There's a clue as to where he might have gone wrong in that sentence: 'country' has a slightly different meaning to 'world'.

Quite. Mid-way through the article, Brown is generous enough to quote someone who thinks the Express is talking rubbish:

The Met Office’s Barry Gromett said December and January’s cold weather was 'within the bounds of variability' in a global trend of rising temperatures in which 2009 is set to be the fifth warmest year on record.

Ah. So last year was the fifth warmest year on record and that's still not enough for the Express. The Met Office backed this up with a press release highlighting that in the last week or so:

North-east America, Canada, North Africa, the Mediterranean, and south-west Asia have all seen temperatures above normal – in many places by more than 5°C, and in parts of northern Canada, by more than 10°C.

But look at that sniffy sub-head again: 'And they still claim it's global warming'. The Express clearly doesn't believe a word of it.

But who are 'they'? Who are the mysterious, not-to-be-trusted clique who claim that global warming exists?

Oh:


So three weeks ago, an article by Martyn Brown, on the front page of the Express, claimed that although global warming wasn't caused by human activity, it was definitely happening. Brown wrote:

climate change is natural

and mentioned

the warming we are now experiencing...

And today?

climate experts are still trying to claim the world is growing warmer.

Who needs 'experts' when you have Martyn Brown and the Express?

More chaos at the Express (just not in the way they think)

On Sunday, this blog noted how the Express seems to think every problem is 'chaos' and every bit of criticism is 'fury'.

And, true to form, two days later, this:


And since Sunday, those hacks at the Express have been utterly, bewilderingly obsessed by weather 'chaos'.

Wintry weather brings travel chaos, Eurostar: more chaos could be ahead, Eurostar orders review after chaos, More travel chaos as snow freezes, Weather: Christmas getaway chaos, Travel chaos and accidents on icy roads, Man dies in fall at station as Arctic weather causes chaos and 14 killed in Britain snow chaos.

That's two weather chaos stories per day this week.

And to top it all off, a stunning exclusive on today's front page:


Of course, snowbound generally means shut in or blockaded by snow. Can anyone go on a shopping spree when they are literally snowbound?

But the real 'story' the Express thinks is front page news is that people go shopping on Christmas Eve.

Amazing.