ORCV Safety and Training

A consultation with the BoM.

Back in July, the Bureau of Meteorology released the Marine component of the Forecast Explorer for Victoria and New South Wales, and you can read the article about that great development, HERE. 

The ORCV has once again been invited to attend the BoM Marine Consultative Committee meeting. We all recognise that the weather is a imperative component of our sport and are very fortunate to have a fantastic, government provided BoM, who just happen to also be one of the leaders in their field, the world over. The BoM's website is one of the most popular in Australia and they continue to improve their services.

ORCV Rear Commodore, Neville 'Nifty' Rose, who is also the Chairman of the Training Committee, was kind enough to put some added light on the whole scenario for us. "We have a great and mutually beneficial alliance with the BoM. In addition to being invited to participate in meetings like this, many would not be aware of some of the behind the scenes liaisons conducted between the ORCV and the BoM. Our Race Directors stay in contact with BoM Forecasters, as required, prior to and during our events, including more refined forecasting for a race areas, not necessarily available elsewhere. These interactions are an invaluable resource to the Race Committee’s armoury, which ensure we can continue to put safety first, by enabling even more informed decision making on how to conduct our events. A fantastic and very recent example of this would be the 2011 Melbourne to Apollo Bay (not), where information provided directly by the BoM was invaluable in determining not to send the fleet outside the Heads, which in turn put the inside (Port Phillip) course in to play."

"Additionally, our Basic and Advanced Weather Courses are lead by one of the BoM’s Senior Forecasters, and the BoM also provide a Forecaster to present the weather briefings to you, prior to our major events. As a leading authority on ocean racing, the ORCV welcomes the opportunity to provide expert feedback to the BoM, from an ocean racing perspective, which assists the BoM with continuing to improve their service offerings", commented Nifty.

As a bit of background, the Victorian Marine Consultative Committee usually meets on an annual basis to discuss service changes, feedback and other issues relevant to the Marine community. In the two years since the last meeting, there have been many service changes that need to be reported on. the meeting allows for feedback from mariners, as to how the changes have been received and what future improvements they would like to see. Specifically, the meeting will cover areas like the Bass Strait forecast, Melbourne Local Waters forecast maps, the aforementioned Marine Forecast Explorer, the performance of text phrases in Coastal and Local Waters forecasts, the changes to the forecast/warning layout on the Bureau's website, investigate future changes to BoM Products and Services and a proposed format change for marine warnings.

"Now as you have come to expect from us, we’ll report back here, after we’ve attended BoM Marine Consultative Committee meeting with anything relevant for you, our wonderful members and the sailing community at large...", Nifty finished with.

Thanks BoM - love your work...

ORCV Land also extends on to the ORCV Facebook page, so make sure you go and "Like" the page, now. 185 Souls already have and a big thank you to each and every one of you.

© John Curnow, ORCV Media

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	The BoM are just fantastic to us as ORCV and as sailors, one and all. Thank you.