First modern weather map
Primer mapa meteorológico moderno
- Date
- octubre de 1861 · confidence high
- Place
- London, England, United Kingdom
- Credited to
- Francis Galton
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
What it is
Galton compiled data from weather stations across Britain and plotted them with his own symbol system on a map published in The Times, creating the first modern weather map as understood today. Years earlier, Urbain Le Verrier had argued in France, after a storm sank the allied fleet in the Crimean War, that such a map could have foreseen the storm's path.
Wikidata credited this hito to Urbain Le Verrier, but his real contribution was earlier and theoretical — after the 1854 Crimean storm, he argued that such a map could have predicted the storm's path; the first properly modern weather map was published by Francis Galton in 1861.
What it led to
- National weather services with synoptic maps
- Storm-warning weather forecasting
Built on
- Stevenson screen1864
- Telegraph networks of weather stations