Is it real weather or predicted weather

That would explain the discrepancies. I got good winds aloft and they were interpolated very well. The local weather was not accurate though. Temps and winds were but clouds were not.

So just wondering if it’s a predictive model meaning a weather sandbox. Conditions are not a copy and paste of real world meters, but instead temps dew point winds ect determines what clouds you see.

If that’s the case they need to tweak the models a bit because it can be way off sometime

One of many things that are unclear. Is it the predictions that are inaccurate, or is it the MSFS rendition of those predictions which is off.

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It seems to be a combination, but it’s complicated.

Incidentally no, They’re not a copy and paste of real world METAR, which is good, because METAR is a massive oversimplification of the weather, and not really a good source to create a weather model.

That being said, it’s obviously not infallible, but in my experience, it’s accurate most of the time. Impressively so, actually. It’s certainly ways better than methods based on METAR that I’ve seen or tried.

This is not to say it’s perfect, and accuracy will likely improve over time as MeteoBlue improves its tech and predictive models. They’re a company that works for lots of clients, not just MSFS, so they’re always improving what they do in order to stay ahead in their business.

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Summary? I’m at work so I can’t watch, but I’m curious to know

It’s way too complex, so I suggest watching the video when you get home.

Well based on the winds aloft and everything it seems like weather is working it’s just procedurally generated weather not real world weather I’d be okay with that.

We would just need a different metar system based off the sim world and not the real world

It’s using Meteoblues prediction model.

Periodically it will get fed current data and then extrapolates. The advantage is dynamic, smooth and natural weather transitions.

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The one major positive item for me about Meteoblue is the ability to have a global weather engine and “not” just metar injected weather. I’m afraid if I go to a 3rd party developer like REX, I will totally lose the global weather effect. It’s very immersive when you can actually see a thunderstorm line ahead of a cold front per se’.

MSFS is the first sim that has allowed me to fly parallel to a line of thunderstorms. That along with the clouds basically being rendered much further out than other sims is a great thing. I used to hate not being able to see a thunderstorm in P3d until I flew in range of the cloud draw distance (ie 100 miles). Now, being able to actually see the volumetric storm much further out (all the way to the horizon) allows for the immersion of actually “deviating” around a cell.

Now, the downside so far for me is the often inaccurate METAR weather at the airport. I’m sure it’s much more difficult to do, but if they can keep the awesome global weather engine and figure out how to have more consistent METAR weather conditions at the aerodrome, It will be complete. I hope this is achievable!

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Why does the weather have to match exactly what you see out your house window?. This is a sim. I’m happy if the weather is A at my departure, B during flight and C at my destination. As long as the weather is there and changes/varies during my sim flight and it’s immersive I’m fine with it. Maybe they should just use a random weather generator that takes into account your location and time of year etc to generate weather. If you want total weather accuracy go and fly a real plane.

I think some people that try to fly as realistically as possible (VATSIM, students, people with lots of time on their hands… :grinning: )depend on accurate weather for active runways, planning VFR vs IFR etc.

It’s just a different way to enjoy the sim.

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Ain’t that the truth. I’m so busy with schoolwork I have no time, whatsoever, for VATSIM. The only time I fly is on the weekends if there’s not too much work.

I don’t need accurate to the degree weather but just need weather that is plausible ie if it’s overcast but In game shows broken that’s fine. But when you have a metar reporting overcast but it’s clear in a million that’s not good.

Flying on vatsim weather should override sim weather…

But if I’m flying offline and I use ForeFlight for weather I’m planning runways, approaches ect off what the metar is saying as i would do in real life.

If not give us Metars in game then I wouldn’t have to use ForeFlight weather

Kinda hard to plan a legit flight properly when you don’t know what weather to expect enroute and at your destination…

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The current known issues says this…

LIVE WEATHER

Inconsistencies

We use METAR reports and Meteoblue weather forecasts to represent the live weather experienced in the sim. They are updated at regular intervals, but they can lack precision. Most of the time they will match but sometimes, they will not.

If you observe wildly inaccurate weather, please submit a bug report .

AFAIK it is the only acknowledgement from Asobo of the use of METARs along with the Meteoblue forecast information.

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If the Meteoblue model is no less accurate than what goes into TAF and other aviation weather forecast products I think that takes care of the flight planning aspect. Real weather does not always match the TAF either, depending on the weather type and local climate it can be slightly off (usually is) or significantly off (rare, except in areas where weather variations are unpredictable).

Where it gets a little more problematic is when using real life METAR “now-data” along with the sim. E.g., using current METAR off Skyvector to check weather for approach since the in-game ATIS is broken. Once the ATIS is fixed so we do not have to do that anymore the problem partly goes away. Except for those of us who use the online METAR as a stand-in for the fact that we don’t have in-game datalink weather…

Basically as long as we use only sim-weather as now-weather the minute-level inaccuracies between Meteoblue nowcasts and the real-life METAR actual current data does not affect the flight.

That really only leaves VATSIM users and other mixed-platform users with a problem. When some users use METAR data and others use Meteoblue data, and the wind direction is 180 degrees different because airmass thunderstorms form at different times, runway assignment doesn’t work.

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It is not “real” in the sense that it is examining every point on Earth at every altitude to determine the current actual conditions.

It is “real” in the sense that it is based on weather modeling using actual measured data like that used in weather forecasts so with sufficient resolution and data it can be pretty accurate. But it is more complicated than normal weather modeling because I’m pretty sure the weather forecast does not consider how wind bounces off buildings (I could be wrong, I don’t keep up with improvements).

It is simply impossible to create what most people would call “real” weather but that doesn’t mean it can’t be accurate. Accurate 100% of the time everywhere on Earth? No way. But it is improving year after year.

I am pretty sure there has been a disconnect between the visual representation of weather in the game and winds/turbulence which can make it feel pretty odd. Those are just bugs, it seems better in the current patch, except for the lightening :slight_smile:

As much as people complain about too much turbulence in light aircraft it is still pretty under done. In summer at 3,500 feet I get bounced around like a marble in a shaken can. I don’t get that in the MSFS at the moment. So I feel weather is improving but not quite there yet.

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This is all FINE, except what we need really really badly is a system that shows the weather, as it is in FS2020 so we can plan our flights and know what to expect. Kind of like a windy.com but for whatever the FS World is currently doing. That would be a HUGE improvement IMO.

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It doesn’t have to match exactly; at least for me, just more consistency than it has now. And that pesky lightning bug fixed.

Actually it does quite a good job at matching what I see outside my window. METARs often don’t match the real world counterparts. I can live with that. As you said - it’s a sim.

If METAR’s often don’t match the real world then why do they even exist?

Way too many people are happy with “live” weather that isn’t in anyway live just because they see some pretty clouds.