Weather Routing: Spot the not so subtle political dig

Seamus is the resident weather router on board, I am very much the back-up, but I have been paying close attention as the North Atlantic can get nasty quickly. You have all watched "Perfect Storm"

It is 2.00am and I am on the 12.00 - 3.00am watch. It is all quiet, moderate wind and seas and we have not seen any other traffic in 4 days. Here is the latest wind forecast from PredictWind using the European weather model.

We are 290 nautical miles from Horta in the Azores. The area to the left is shaded because it is a weather warning: "48 hour forecast from 56n to 61n between 35w and 50w winds 25 to 40 kt. seas 3 to 6 m. elsewhere from 53n to 60n between 35w and 50w...and n of 56n between 45w and and 60w winds 20 to 30 kt. seas to 4 m."

At first glance that looks like we have a low pressure system barreling down on top of us and we are about to be hit with 40 knot winds and 6m (23ft) waves!! Now we could handle that I am sure, but it would be very uncomfortable (and a lot of fun).

Windy shows the bigger picture:

Note the orange colour of the the depression sweeping across the planet.Elbows up!

But now with the benefit of these tools we can wind the clock forward and watch the forecast update as we progress along our route.

Here you can see the orange bag of hot air drifts away from Canada towards Greenland! We progress safely along our route in clear blue air.

I hear some lyrics calling....