The weather industry is a funny old thing. It's a science and one where tweaks and improvements are constantly being added and done in order to try to create a better weather forecast for you guys.
The GFS underwent a pretty major overhaul last year, but the end goal was always to get the model with a Finite� Volume Cubed-Sphere dynamical core. Now, whilst this may sound like we are going to try to describe the entire process of numerical modelling, we aren't. The new model is called FV3 and has been in development for a few years now at NCEP. They have even plugged various parts of it into the GFS already, but they always knew the entire model would need to work based on a new set of physics and this is where the FV3 comes in to play.
There are three main and large advances over using the new FV3 core at the heart of the GFS. Firstly, it's faster. Much faster! And this means that there is the scope not just to increase resolution but also the amount of runs per day.
Secondly, the vertical motion of the atmosphere is modeled much better. In large scale systems this isn't much of an issue, but the FV3 is able resolve things like thunderstorms and up/downdrafts in a way the current GFS can't.
Lastly, the shape of the files and modelling of the atmosphere is different. Gone are the grids and instead replaced with isohedral shapes which allow not only resolution to be increased quickly, but shapes of things like thunderstorms and frontal systems are modeled much clearer.
But don't take our word for it. The charts are now available on Metcheck and we thing they are rather good. If you got to the end of this article and are still wondering what on earth we are talking about, then don't worry, some new toys for you guys coming next week on the site.
METEOROLOGIST : EXCITED
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