Predicting the weather...‘We don’t have a magic 8 ball’

Paul Downes grew up two miles outside Mullingar on the family stud farm and has always had an interest in weather, particularly extreme weather; he studied at one the top institutions in the world, the University of Oklahoma in Norman, a few miles south of Oklahoma city, in the heart of Tornado Alley.

Now a meteorologist with Met Éireann, Paul is a professional in Irish weather prediction, and says that in his lifetime, he has seen how weather patterns in Ireland have changed. He says that while he is a meteorologist and not a climate scientist, there is an “overwhelming volume of evidence that climate change is undeniable”.

“I think in Ireland we feel because our weather is not as extreme as elsewhere in the world, we are less at risk, but our society has been built around the framework of our average weather patterns and as they change, it will put pressure on the system, including the likes of our power generation stresses – it is a sign of the kind of issues we may face and have to adapt to,” he says.

Talking about his background Paul begins: “My parents stud stallions at Russellstown, for many years, but mostly we have had a few families of mares that we breed from – breeding horses is a vocation rather than a job,” he adds.

“At one point I ran the farm and took great passion in being part of the horses’ lives. I foaled many mares over the years, and was there at the magical moments – when new life came in to the world, it never loses its magic. Even in the early hours of the morning on bitterly cold and snowy night during Storm Emma!

“I won’t lie, horses scared me as a child. At one point I fell off more than I stayed on, but I grew to love it. The relationship between human and horse is not only eye-opening but healing. Having been abroad for eight years and coming back to work for Met Éireann, my direct involvement with horses has been greatly curtailed, but I do have a filly that is about to turn four, and she is a little gem.

“I’m hoping to race her with a friend and see if she falls in love with it too. I would like to have a few more mares of my own a few years down the line, and carry on the family tradition and old family bloodlines that have served us well.”

Paul also has an interest in theatre and has played ‘Baby John’ in West Side Story at Mullingar Arts Centre, the butler of Dunguaire Castle in Galway for summer performances, in ‘Falstaff’ the Opera at the University of Oklahoma, and more recently as ‘Chief Bromden’ in a Mullingar Theatre Lab production of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.

“I did it to face another fear – anxiety can be major roadblock at times and I really became ill at the thoughts of performing or even presenting in college or at work meetings. This was a way to face a fear and do something I secretly always wanted to do.

“After that, I actually went and spent a year in an acting course in Cork. The anxiety has never fully left me, but now I deliver my forecasts live on the radio and have presented a few live and pre-recorded segments for television I focus on passing on the message, be it weather related or a character on stage.”

He also loves to sing and was part of the Irish Youth Choir, the Cathedral Choristers, Mullingar Coral Society, Cathedral Choir and the Mullingar Gospel Choir, and has performed in four different countries and languages. “Choirs have been one of the greatest sources of lifelong friendships for me. I have performed a few songs solo, but I am still shockingly nervous at that, but someday hopefully I can go further with it.

“I also love photography – weather and wildlife mostly. I like to swim, kayak, hike and cycle, and when I can, I do love to cook.”

• We Irish love our weather; when did your interest in weather start?

“I would have to say while I feel like I have always had an eye to the sky, it was my primary school teacher, Mr Kevin Egan in Curraghmore, that really sparked my interest, and I had my first weather books at an early age. I do remember getting a school report card saying ‘Paul has his head in the clouds most of the time’ – somehow, back then, I took pride in that!

“I was fascinated by nature programmes on the television, especially anything to do with tornadoes, and that fascination and wonder really sparked my need for knowledge, which frankly never ends. The complexity of weather and its many driving forces leave many unanswered questions and I believe that at the heart of every meteorologist, or in fact every scientist, we want to unravel the unknown and add to society in a way to, not only saves lives, but better them too.

“For me, school was not easy, I struggled and I was encouraged away from college by my career guidance teacher at the time. I took no heed and set out for the University of Limerick to study production management in 2000, and, predictably, I struggled, but I scraped through and got my degree. Victory! Or so I thought. While I learned a great deal, my final year project was based on weather-related products and beyond that I struggled in the job market and honestly the motivation was lacking. All through college though’ I was ‘wasting’ time researching all I could about weather, on forums asking questions and learning to read all the different weather maps.

“It was from one of those forums in May of 2003 that I got the chance to go storm chasing. In fact, it was a case where a group of four were going to America the following week and one had dropped out last minute. They advertised on the forum for someone to join. I was on work experience in Intel at the time and had some savings put away, so I jumped at the chance. From that first trip, I made contacts and returned following my final year in the summer of 2004 to the College of DuPage in Chicago.

“They run a storm chasing course, where you learn as you go – that to me was great food for my passion and I kept returning. In 2009 I moved to Chicago to enrol in the college. At first it was to just test the waters – could I defy the odds and actually succeed in this science when to date, other than at times in maths, I really had a fairly poor record. And I did struggle at times, but the mentality was different now that I was following my passion, and the As followed, occasionally at the start but then more frequently as my confidence grew.

“After two years there, and with some relevant college course credits under my belt, I found myself in a position to dream that I could succeed and go further, so I decided to look at universities around America. I sent applications off to a few and hoped for the best. At one point I had a sort of ‘go big or go home’ moment and applied to one of, if not the, top universities in the world to study meteorology, the University of Oklahoma (OU). Situated in Norman, Oklahoma, just a few miles south of Oklahoma city, OU was in the heart of Tornado Alley, it truly is the heart of severe weather research and many of the pivotal meteorological advancements of this generation have some connection with the OU.

“When I got the acceptance letter from OU, I had a sense of elation, fear and confusion. OU’s school of Meteorology has a big dropout rate, 120 started in first year, I was part of a further 30 who joined straight into sophomore (second) year, and in the end out of 150, just 35 of us graduated. I felt like a fraud, I had imposter syndrome and it probably stopped me from going on to do a masters at the time. Even though I finished with just one B and all the rest As in the very tough final year. But I always found time to go storm chasing, sometimes with friends and other times alone. You never really know if you have the knack for forecasting and reading the weather until you try it alone.

“Alone, I learned to trust my forecast ability and instincts. While storm chasing, you have no other choice but to make the right decisions, it is not to be messed with and safety has to come first. Every element of the forecast has to cover all eventualities and mitigate the risk. Storm chasing is an amazing way to see the science at work and it can be awe-inspiringly beautiful, while devastatingly dangerous and it must be respected.”

• Tell us about your role in Met Éireann.

“I spent the guts of three years after graduation working on American and Copenhagen routing ships all over the world, as weather is so important for safe and economical shipping. It gave me a global overview and every day at work I could be routing ships anywhere in the world, avoiding hurricanes and using the weather to save fuel costs and reduce Co2 emissions where possible. I first started in Met Éireann after returning to Ireland in 2018 as a met officer and I worked in the Agricultural Meteorology section there, it was a rewarding few years and I was glad to have some impact in improving forecasts for the sector.

“I interviewed for the forecast meteorologist position in 2019 and was promoted in spring of 2020, less than a month before the Covid-19 lockdown hit. In some ways starting shift work during a lockdown actually wasn’t so bad, we continued to forecast from the headquarters in Glasnevin for most of our shifts, and at least seeing my colleagues was a bonus in the lonely times, even when it was from the far side of a room and a mask.”

As part of Paul’s job, he has to deliver the general forecast in time slots before the 8am news and the 6pm news on RTÉ One, as well as the sea area forecast after the 6am news, and both of the sea area and the general forecast before the midnight news. “We can also field calls for live or pre-recorded segments on different stations and also for some television segments. I can’t say it’s not daunting, but it has been interesting developing my story telling techniques and styles of delivery, and at the end of the day we need to get the right message out there.”

• What is it like being at the epicentre of forecasting the weather?

“Forecasting for Met Éireann has been a unique experience. These days, there are many factors to consider and risks to assess but really, I do enjoy watching a forecast evolve and come together. So much of our job is pattern recognition, because while the computer models are vastly improved, the number of observation stations around the world are nothing close to the number of data points in a computer model, so a lot of assumptions are made and models aren’t always right. Our job as forecasters is to interrogate the forecast and the science behind it.

“We look at many different models and model ensembles. Using baking cupcakes as an example – each one has a slightly different ingredient or cooking method. Inevitably some will end up in the bin and then you need to decide on the best one or an combination of multiple outcomes to make a forecast. It is also pattern recognitions and we need to know how the forecast is evolving in real time and how that might affect it six, 12 or 24 hours ahead and beyond.

“Subtle difference can alter the forecast drastically. And contrary to some beliefs, we don’t have a magic 8 ball – it is all about probability, and while we give general forecasts, weather can change rapidly and over a short distance but we have it give a best fit for the country or region.

“While it might seem cool to be at the heart of the forecast in Met Éireann’s HQ, there is also a lot of responsibility, so many organisations now trigger their action plans off the status of a warning, and that can have a big impact on society. While we are not the actual ones shutting down schools or writing the headlines, decisions on warnings and storm naming do not come easily or without days of assessing the risk.

“A professor once told me, ‘When it comes to the weather, the more you know, the more you realise what we don’t know’. I would be liar if I said I was a perfect forecaster but I do my best to constantly improve my knowledge and stills.”

• Would you class yourself among the ‘climate change’ camp or are you a ‘climate denier’?

“First off, while meteorology focuses in on weather and the short-term, small-scale patterns that affect our day to day weather, climate scientists focus on the larger scale pattern that will eventually lead to a future changed weather pattern. The science of forecasting tends towards chaos, as in, the predictability becomes more and more uncertain day by day and hour by hour because of the amount of detail we need to produce a forecast. Climate change doesn’t generally focus on that sort of detail – it focuses on larger scale patterns that are the main driving forces for our weather.

“I may have had more doubts when I started studying meteorology, but I have chosen to constantly critically review the mountains of research and assess the global weather patterns as a whole for myself. There really is an overwhelming volume of evidence that climate change is undeniable. Even the weather patterns in my lifetime have shown evidence that change is under way, maybe not just focusing on one specific event but the number of unprecedented extreme weather events we have been seeing across the world is exceptional. Even looking at the stresses on farmers, among others, over the last few years with such challenging conditions as the switch from waterlogging or flooding to drought, extreme heat events and yes at times extreme cold events. And globally wild fires, more intense damaging hurricanes and there are changes in the patterns of where the hurricanes develop and track.

“There is evidence of a more disturbed weather pattern and that poses a great uncertainty for the further. Really though, the data doesn’t lie, it is fact that the climate is warming, and in Ireland it is warming at a similar rate to the rest of the world.

• What’s your opinion on activists like Greta Thunberg, a force for good making the world’s leaders sit up and take notice, or a cause for climate anxiety, particularly among young people?

“Anxiety has been a great barrier to me but also a great catalyst to push the boundaries and achieve the change that I wanted. While it is not my position to say what the right way is to bring about the changes we need, to slow and eventually reverse climate change, anything is possible if we really want it. It will involve sacrifices in the short term, but I’d personally rather that, than face potential consequences way worse and have no choices left.”

• How has Irish weather changed over the years, is there a big shift, and are we being affected by climate change?

“We have seen some interesting weather events over the last few years and while people tend to focus on the major weather events, often the real change is more subtle like, up to the recent spell of cold weather, temperatures have been running above average for many months.

Over the last few winters, the number of sharp frosts is down, and when we do get cold snaps like we had in December, they tend to be more extreme, and like that of 2010.

“Here are some of the facts:

– Our average temperatures are increasing at a similar rate to global average rises;

– Each month of 2022 was above average, although it does look like December will come in below average owing to the cold snap;

– Up to the end of November, the last below average month was May 2021;

– In 2022 the July and August monthly maximum highest day time temperature records were broken;

– On average the frequency of warm nights has been rising faster than the frequency of warm days.

• Will we see more climate extremes next year, here and worldwide?

“Statistically it is likely, referring back to the magic 8 ball though, predicting where or what the extremes may be is not something we are capable of due to the chaotic nature of the atmosphere, but there are patterns that we can see. Climate scientists agree that we will continue to see extreme events increasing globally. Last year we were extremely close to breaking a high temperature record that has stood for over 100 years and over the next few years I wouldn’t be surprised if we are rewriting that record too.

“I think in Ireland we feel because our weather is not as extreme as elsewhere in the world, we are at less of a risk, but our society has been built around the framework of our average weather patterns and as they change, it will put pressure on the system.

The likes of our power generation stresses, while it is not all related to climate chance right now, climate change will increase the stresses on our society and it is a sign of the kind of issues we may face and adapt to.

As a truly global society now too we will also need to provide support to other countries that will struggle more in the shorter term.”