this post was submitted on 25 Jul 2024
19 points (95.2% liked)

Weather and Meteorology

174 readers
1 users here now

Hope to expand on this later. A community for discussing the weather (very UK), amateur meteorology, and moaning it's too hot/cold/wet/dry/mild.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

A bug in the matrix or just the radar? This is no normal cloud-shape, is it?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Emperor@feddit.uk 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] wren@feddit.uk 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

Wait, I'm wrong yet again!!!! "A bug in the matrix" in the description should have clued me in...

The DWD network is surely more reliable than this, and it's nice high pressure, so it's rain-free and plenty of updrafts, so it's perfect conditions for insects!! They cause enormous signals, no idea why I didn't think of it first.

(Seen recently in the news in the UK here )

[–] Peter_Arbeitslos@feddit.org 2 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Damn, I thought insects was some English meterological term for special clouds, but really? Insects? Thats kind of amazing!

[–] wren@feddit.uk 2 points 1 month ago

Yeah, I don't know why I didn't think of it earlier!

One of my colleagues is doing radar bug-signal research. Supposedly, bugs show up as pretty bright signals on radar (similar size to raindrops!), and if you use doppler, you can pick up how fast the wind speed is by assuming the bugs are being transported by the wind

Also: lots of other fun things (bats, trains, smoke) show up on radar

[–] Peter_Arbeitslos@feddit.org 1 points 1 month ago
[–] Peter_Arbeitslos@feddit.org 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I haven't heard about it, but it's the most reasonable explanation. The radars have been influenced by the swarms of insects, but only by those which were near to the radar-locations as it's described on the screenshot below.

The website is really old: https://www.radartutorial.eu/15.weather/wr22.en.html