I do not understand anything about wind forecasting. I'm in Sydney ! I often get very excited about a forecast for a great day's windsurfing, only to hang around doing nothing for a few hours, totally frustrated.
With all the technology around how is it we can't get a better forecast ?
Can someone please explain why the forecasts are so poor ?

Imagine what it was like for us oldies in the 80's with no internet and BOM once daily 'over' forecasting!

The N.E's especially are sensitive to cloud cover. For a NE sea breeze to "suck in" you need the temp diff between the coast and inland. The hot air rises over the West sucking the cool air in from the sea to replace it. If a good NE is forecast and it is cloudy in the morning there is a chance that the NE will not be as strong as forecast. Clear morning and starts coming in at 11. Happy days!!! You need to also couple this with the synoptic charts as Moby says with the closer the isobars the stronger the wind. However this is also a function of latitude as well, and higher the latitude the stronger the wind for the same spacing between the isobars.

tomp said..
Imagine what it was like for us oldies in the 80's with no internet and BOM once daily 'over' forecasting!

Remember calling the BOM to get the recorded forecast from a phone which was connected to the wall, mine even had a round dial with numbers in it on the top of it.
Was the number 11541?

At the end of my street there's a tall gum tree standing 20m + if the branches swing back and forth it's good enough for a sail.