A 12-YEAR-OLD from Reading has been named a champion weather forecaster.
Ruth Harper, who attends Kendrick School, took on the experts in a weather game run by the University of Reading.
She has been awarded the title of champion school player out of more than 70 pupils to sign up.
The six-week game challenged players to predict the weather in locations all over the world using professional forecasting websites as a guide.
As well as topping the school league table, Ruth finished 11th overall, beating dozens of experienced researchers at their own game.
Ruth turned to the Weather Game for entertainment, and battled her brother, eight-year-old Aidan, who finished fourth in the school category.
She said: “I really enjoyed participating in the Weather Game as I often find it frustrating when forecasts aren’t accurate and my family and I end up in a thunderstorm when it was supposed to be bright and sunny.
“So I thought it would be fun to give it a shot and see how hard it can be.
“If there is anything that the Weather Game has taught me, it is that weather forecasting is no easy task.”
She added: “In the first week, I looked at the weather that everyone had to forecast and was confused. I had never encountered having to predict hours of sunshine or millimetres of precipitation.
“So I took a few wild guesses and ended up earning the highest score of mine throughout the six weeks.
“Over the following weeks, the things that I was confused about at first became clearer, though hours of sunshine still baffle me slightly.”
The Weather Game has been run for Meteorology staff and students at Reading for several years, but this was the first time it had been opened up to the public.
Players were encouraged to look at numerous professional forecasts to spot similarities and differences, and then use their intuition to predict things like total rainfall, total sunshine and temperature highs and lows over each weekend.
The data included measurements taken at the University of Reading’s Atmospheric Observatory, where staff and students get first-hand experience of how weather elements are recorded.
Professor Andrew Charlton-Perez, head of the department of Meteorology at the University of Reading, said: “Congratulations to all of the winners of our first ever public Weather Game. We were hugely impressed with the accuracy of the predictions as players took on the infamously difficult task of weather forecasting.
“Even more pleasing than the quality of the predictions was the fact that more than 200 people from all over the world were able to take a closer look at how weather is forecast. Hopefully by questioning the data and making their own estimates they now have a greater understanding of how difficult forecasts are to make and why they vary so much.
“Any school and guest players who enjoyed the Weather Game are welcome to join us as students at Reading, where many well-known televisions forecasters learnt their trade.
“There are a wealth of careers open to Meteorology graduates, including helping the world cope with the effects of climate change, keeping astronauts safe in space, and harnessing nature to produce renewable energy.”
Each winner was awarded a copy of the book 100 Years of Reading Weather, written by University of Reading meteorologists Stephen Burt and Dr Roger Brugge.
