What is BBC Weather?
'''BBC Weather''' is the [[BBC]]'s department in charge of preparing and broadcasting weather forecasts and is now part of [[BBC News]]. The broadcast meteorologists are employed by the [[Met Office]].<ref>On [[ITV]], the weather forecasts are bought in from the Met Office, but presented by ITV or [[ITN]] staff.</ref> The longest serving presenter of BBC weather was Michael Fish, now retired, who appeared for 30 years between 1974 and 2004. ==History== ===Early history=== The first BBC [[weather forecast]] was a [[shipping forecast]] read on the radio for the [[Met Office]] on 14 November 1922. The first daily weather forecast was broadcast 26 March 1923. In 1936, the BBC experimented with the world's first [[weather map]]s on television. Weather maps were first published in ''[[The Times]]'' on 1 April 1875.<ref>[[Francis Galton]], [http://www.galton.org/meteorologist.html meteorologist]</ref> The BBC started broadcasting the maps in 1949 after [[World War II]]. The map filled the whole TV screen, and an off-screen narrator would comment on the next day's weather. === Advance of technology === On 11 January 1954, [[George Cowling]] was the first weather forecaster to stand in front of a weather map. To do this, the maps were drawn by hand in the London Weather Centre and were taken across London. The forecasts were presented by the same person who had made them, and were not always right. In 1962, a [[fax]] machine and an electronic [[computer]] were bought by the Met Office. This gave better and quicker forecasting. [[Satellite photography]] was available from 1964, but was of a poor quality and was given on paper, with the coastline etched in [[felt-tip pen]]. This did not change until 1973 when a new computer was bought. This made forecasts twice as accurate as earlier ones. ===Graphical technology=== As computational capability improved, so did graphics technology. Early hand-drawn maps gave way to magnetic symbols, which in turn gave way to [[bluescreen]] [[Colour-separation overlay|(CSO)]] [[computer