Tourist attraction bosses call for sunnier weather forecasts

Wrong forecasts are causing considerable damage to outdoor attractions as day trippers cancel plans to go out because of poor weather prospects, Joep Thonissen, head of tourist attraction association Recron told news agency ANP.


‘Last week it was really good weather over most of the country but the weather forecasts were full of heavy rain and thunderstorms, so people stayed home,’ Thonissen said.
‘And heavy rain above Hilversum does not mean that is the case in the rest of the country,’ he added. The KNMI weather bureau is based close to Hilversum.
On Tuesday, tourist attraction bosses in Belgium called for ‘less pessimistic forecasts’ and urged meteorologists to pay as much attention to sun as they do to rain.
And on Monday, local councillors in Hoek van Holland said weather forecasters who got it wrong should be fined. Bad forecasts are spoiling the local seaside trade, the Labour councillors said.
A spokesman for the KNMI told the Telegraaf on Wednesday afternoon commercial weather bureaus are responsible for ‘all those weather chats on radio, television and in the newspapers’.
‘They use the raw data we deliver but its up to them how their forecasts turnout,’ Cees Molenaars is quoted as saying.
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