Question about Weather and Wind Forecasts during crossings

[Projectfreedom]

I've seen some videos with people using wind and weather apps while sailing. Im curious, what is this? Is this fairly normal? My boating up until now is Outboard open fisherman but plan to start a new life aboard a sailboat.

However the only real concern is sailing in the dark as to what weather is coming and where the wind is (as we all know weather can come up fast in this region). I live in South Florida and plan to work my way into the Caribbean as I gain more experience (starting with the Bahamas and Keys).

Any tips or links to do some research would be very helpful.

Thank you.

[shmorrell]

Old post. Can’t believe no one has replied.

I think most cruisers use PredictWind Offshore for wind and wave forecasts. They access the data with Iridium Go or other satellite internet access. As far as very localized weather I would imagine radar would be a good option.

[Paul L]

Originally Posted by shmorrell

Old post. Can’t believe no one has replied.

I think most cruisers use PredictWind Offshore for wind and wave forecasts. They access the data with Iridium Go or other satellite internet access. As far as very localized weather I would imagine radar would be a good option.

Not really. Most offshore cruisers use the various Grib files available, like GFS. They get these via a satellite or HF radio connection. Predictwind is just one of the delivery methods of a getting a Grib file.

[DMF Sailing]

Originally Posted by Projectfreedom

I've seen some videos with people using wind and weather apps while sailing. Im curious, what is this? Is this fairly normal? My boating up until now is Outboard open fisherman but plan to start a new life aboard a sailboat.

However the only real concern is sailing in the dark as to what weather is coming and where the wind is (as we all know weather can come up fast in this region). I live in South Florida and plan to work my way into the Caribbean as I gain more experience (starting with the Bahamas and Keys).

Any tips or links to do some research would be very helpful.

Thank you.

Others know far more than me, but inn answer to the question "What is this," I'd start with, "I'm traveling in a vessel that relies on wind and goes 6-8 knots per hour with good wind or under power. I want to make sure I have enough and not too much where I want to go, and if there's not enough or too much where I'm going, I want to have time to change my plans."

Even Windy, a free (I think? or cheap? I forget) app I use a lot when bumming around coastal New England, helps me plan passages so that there are fewer unpleasant surprises.

Did that help?

[fxykty]

Originally Posted by Paul L

Not really. Most offshore cruisers use the various Grib files available, like GFS. They get these via a satellite or HF radio connection. Predictwind is just one of the delivery methods of a getting a Grib file.

Well, Saildocs is a free way to get gribs, with a few different models available. Mailasail offers free gribs if you subscribe to their teleport service, but fewer models. PredictWind Offshore on the free package offers a few extra models. They all have GFS.

There are a number of grib viewers available, including OpenCPN, PW Offshore, zyGrib, etc.

For HF you’ll need a Pactor modem, while for satellite you’ll need a satellite phone, Iridium GO, inReach or similar and a plan. Both methods are relatively slow, with dropouts generally more likely with radio. Iridium has near global coverage, Inmarsat much less. Starlink, once it becomes mobile, will be a game changer and likely put all the other satellite companies out of business.

One of the benefits of the paid PW Standard and Professional packages is the departure planning and weather routing features. With PW you only send and receive very small files, one to request the service and the second to receive the routing. PW computes the departure planning/weather routing on its servers using the highest resolution possible weather model gribs, so you get a very accurate routing with very small files.

If you want to do weather routing with OpenCPN for example, you need to download the grib that the programme will use to compute the routing - this grib will need to be relatively low resolution so it doesn’t take too long to download. And the routing will only be done on one model, while PW can do up to 6 models.

It all depends on the features you want, the amounts you want to spend on subscriptions, and whether you prefer to learn or buy the technology to do stuff.