Heaven mail Global Bureau
World Meteorological Day was established in 1951 to commemorate the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), an organization of the United Nations, which was created on 23 March 1950. This organization announces a slogan for World Meteorological Day every year, and this day is celebrated in all member countries.
WMO replaced the International Meteorological Organization. It began operations in 1951 to coordinate member nations in the fields of meteorology, operational hydrology and Earth Sciences for the security of their population. The first World Meteorological Day was held on 23 March 1961.
Themes of recent years
The future of weather, climate and water across generations – 23 March 2023
Early Warning and Early Action – 23 March 2022
The Ocean, Our Climate and Weather – 23 March 2021
Climate and Water – 23 March 2020
The Sun, the Earth and the Weather – 23 March 2019
Weather-ready, climate-smart – 23 March 2018
Understanding clouds – 23 March 2017
Hotter, drier, wetter – Face the future, 23 March 2016
Climate knowledge for Climate Action – 23 March 2015
Weather and Climate: Engaging youth – 23 March 2014.
Focus on weather forecasting
Meteorology is a branch of the atmospheric sciences (which include atmospheric chemistry and physics) with a major focus on weather forecasting. The study of meteorology dates back millennia, though significant progress in meteorology did not begin until the 18th century.
The 19th century saw modest progress in the field after weather observation networks were formed across broad regions. Prior attempts at prediction of weather depended on historical data. It was not until after the elucidation of the laws of physics, and more particularly in the latter half of the 20th century the development of the computer (allowing for the automated solution of a great many modelling equations) that significant breakthroughs in weather forecasting were achieved.
An important branch of weather forecasting is marine weather forecasting as it relates to maritime and coastal safety, in which weather effects also include atmospheric interactions with large bodies of water.
Stripes from the past for the future
Striking graphics known as the climate stripes have been shared widely across the world since they were first produced at the University of Reading in 2017. Each stripe represents the global average temperature for each year since 1850, relative to the average temperature over the period as a whole. Blue stripes represent cooler-than-average years, and red stripes indicate hotter-than-average years. The graphic is a stark visual representation of how human action has heated the climate over time.
Created by Professor Hawkins, more than one million stripes graphics have been downloaded from over 180 countries. Also appearing at the Reading Festival, London Fashion Week, and on the front cover of Greta Thunberg’s Climate Book, temperature data from the past is helping to start conversations about the rapid warming of our planet.
While the climate stripes reveal how much cooler temperatures used to be in the past, they are also being used to show how much warmer the world will get in the years to come. A new version of Professor Hawkins’ graphic has been included in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s sixth Assessment Report, the final synthesis report for which was published (20 March 2023).
