Meteorology (MET) is a monster of a topic. It has a vast amount of knowledge that needs to be retained, it builds on previous knowledge learnt in one chapter to then be able to understand the next chapter, as well as a huge number of facts and figures to be retained for every single type of weather and weather phenomena around the world at different times of the year. All of this is needed for a 84 question exam only lasting 2 hours, a very difficult task when some of the questions are quite hard to interpret what they’re asking you, with ‘always’, ‘could’, ‘would’ and ‘may’ all changing what the question is looking for significantly and especially when it can depend on what hemisphere you’re in, the time of year as well as considering the longitude and latitude of the place they are looking for and the weather they’re receiving.
Here I aim to outline the best I can what happens in each chapter that we’ve learnt to give you some kind of idea the shear volume we have to learn in such a short period of time and then commit to memory ready for exams along with the other subjects that we are also learning at the same time. As I’ve already mentioned there is a lot to learn for meteorology and some of the theories rely on you understanding some of the basic principles learnt at the beginning, such as Buys Ballot’s Law, where standing with your back into the wind, a low pressure system is on your left in the Northern Hemisphere and right in the Southern Hemisphere. This is then needed when it comes to jet streams, different types of wind as well as pressure gradients.
I consider myself lucky that I managed to grasp some of the earlier topics due to taking both GCSE and A-Level Geography which meant it was time for me to repay some of the others that have helped me on other subjects of the course. I stayed behind to further explain some of the earlier topics that I had previously done at GCSE and A-Level, and I owe a massive thank you to those who I explained it to as some of the time I didn’t explain it in the best way but you were all patient with me and allowed me to try and untangle myself when explaining it, so thank you. The breakdown of all the topics we needed to learn are as follows:
- Chapter 1: The atmosphere,
- Chapter 2: Temperature and heating,
- Chapter 3: Atmospheric pressure,
- Chapter 4: Atmospheric density,
- Chapter 5: Pressure systems,
- Chapter 6: Altimetry,
- Chapter 7: Humidity,
- Chapter 8: Adiabatic processes and stability,
- Chapter 9: Turbulence and wind shear,
- Chapter 10: Low level winds,
- Chapter 11: Upper winds and jet streams,
- Chapter 12: Cloud classification,
- Chapter 13: Cloud formation and precipitation,
- Chapter 14: Thunderstorms,
- Chapter 15: Icing,
- Chapter 16: Visibility,
- Chapter 17: Air masses.
- Chapter 18: Fronts and frontal depressions,
- Chapter 19: Non-frontal depressions,
- Chapter 20: Climatology,
- Chapter 21: Remote sensing,
- Chapter 22: Reporting and forecasting.
All of these chapters make up a total of 52 hours in the classroom learning a total of 697 pages plus any additional information we need to know. Although when you may compare it to the other 2 subjects we have learnt in module 1 it may seem that we have had a lot more time for less amount to cover, but that’s not the case. We need to understand the full process for the weather formation which included at lot of facts and figures at each various stage. Take thunderstorms for example, there are a total of 3 stages each with different weather, how its fuelled and what the hazards are to both the ground and flight at each of the various stages.
Meteorology has been really enjoyable to learn. Did it help having a background knowledge before I came into the classroom? Yes and no. Yes, because some of the basics I knew beforehand from both GCSE and A-Level so it was almost like a mini-refresher rather than learning it from scratch. No, because as I’d already embedded less knowledge from previous it made it difficult to see where fitting additional information on top of the knowledge I already knew came into play. So in total, it made the basics easier but the more advanced stuff more difficult meaning its a bit difficult to give a definite answer to the question.
So, within MET, a total of 52 hours to learn 679 pages all to be tested on. My final EASA grade comes down to 2 hours and 84 questions, where anything from all those pages can be tested and most likely will be tested. And I am delighted to announce that after taking my Meteorology EASA exam, I achieved a grade of 89% due to all my hardworking and effort, and I could not be happier with my result.
