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Panic as new BBC weather graphics show England flooded
16 May 2005
Parts of England are in a state of panic this evening following the introduction of new weather graphics by the BBC. The graphics, which ditched familiar symbols in favour of supposedly more accurate 3D representations of the weather, have already caused mass confusion.
One forecast in particular appeared to show much of England submerged under water. Douglas Ramsbottom, a resident of Gainsborough in Lincolnshire, said that he had taken the forecast to mean that he was at imminent risk of being flooded.
"I was out of my home for months last summer when we were flooded – I wasn't going to go through that again," he told DeadBrain via telephone. "As soon as I saw the forecast I went out to the garage and got the sandbags, and started laying them in front of the house. After that I carried all the movable electrical equipment upstairs, and I took all the paperwork I had left as well. I even put all the chairs up on the table."
"It was only when my wife came home from work and fell over the sandbags that I began to think it was probably a false alarm," he added.
Some residents in Scotland are also reported to have fitted snowploughs and chains to their vehicles in response to what they thought were massive snowdrifts, but turned out to be a light frost. "I was so embarrassed," said one. "My neighbour came out and asked what on earth I was doing. He watches ITV and said it was forecast bright sunshine today, not heavy snow. In the end it just rained."
Other viewers are also reported to have suffered sickness after one 3D-flyover went haywire, zooming repeatedly from Cardiff to Southampton before doing a pirouette and heading for the moon.
A spokesman for the BBC admitted that new, more detailed system suffered some teething problems but they would be resolved "in due course". "Now instead of just getting the weather wrong, they can get it wrong in 3D with realistic rain," he added, shortly before being made redundant as part of a cost-cutting programme.
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