Puget Sound Pilots Consult Weather Maps
Masters and pilots embrace modern weather science to predict storms, with real estate agents also tracking data for property viewings.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The Puget Sound Harbor of Masters and Pilots on Saturday evening heard a lecture on the storms of the Pacific coast delivered by H. F. Alciatore, chief of the Weather service station. The lecturer explained the origin, development, and progress of the storms which prevail on this coast, explained the use of the daily weather map issued by the bureau, and detailed the effect of storms on the tides. In the discussion which followed, several pilots said that they had formerly regarded the weather service as rather experimental but were just beginning to realize the value of it. The value attached to the daily maps is shown by the number of persons who have requested to have them delivered to them. This has increased during the last month from forty-eight to sixty-three, including chiefly boatmen, real estate men, and lawyers. Some real estate men place so much confidence in them as to consult them before making appointments to show property to intending purchasers.
“Some real estate men place so much confidence in them as to consult them before making appointments to show property.”
It is fascinating to see the birth of professional meteorology in the Pacific Northwest, where pilots were once skeptical of forecasts. Today, Seattleites rely on real-time radar and complex weather modeling, which has become as much a cultural obsession as it was a commercial necessity in 1894.
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