[Phil Hart]

Monday 22nd October
Synoptic Situation: Broad area of high pressure over SEQ. Isobars well spread out with ESE airflow over FNQ.
Forecast: Isolated morning showers about the coast and ranges, mainly north of Cairns. Light to moderate S to SE winds, fresh and gusty about the coast north of Cairns during the day.
Observed Weather: Extensive and quite solid low cloud offshore, pushing 30km+ inland. A little high cloud offshore as well.

Cloud Forecasts
BoM Access Model: Clear skies on the coast and inland. High cloud a little offshore moving down from the north late morning well after eclipse.
Skippy Sky: Patchy low cloud just off the coast in eclipse area. Extensive high cloud 100km offshore from before sunrise.
EU: Some low cloud around Cairns (15%) and Port Douglas (40%). Low cloud at Mt Carbine clearing to ~50-60% by eclipse time and clear skies by midday. Similar but slightly better further inland at Mt Gibson (next nearest town where forecast available).

BoM and EU models greatly underestimated the amount of low cloud that appeared along the coast this morning., US model also but to a lesser extent. US Model again greatly overstated amount of high cloud generally but BoM model perhaps slightly underestimated.

Chance of Success (if eclipse had been this day)
Coast: <10%
60km Inland: ~40% (could be less but hard to discern cloud extent on satellite image)

Cyclone - if you could give a one sentence summary of what the webcams show for each location each day that would be a big help for me (among other things i can't access your site from work.. it's filtered out under the classification of 'tobacco').

Phil