Why ‘red sky at night …’ turns out to be right

ARTS CORRESPONDENT THEY may sound like little more than old wives’ tales, but great British weather idioms have more truth to them than one might expect, according to the BBC’s weather forecasters.

Carol Kirkwood and John Hammond, who forecasts on

said the phrase “red sky at night, shepherd’s delight” proved surprisingly accurate, while “rain before seven, fine by eleven” was often true.

At Countryfile Live, the programme’s inaugural festival at Blenheim Palace, Hammond said: “The more you learn about the weather, the more amazed you are that we get it right. Predicting the weather in two seconds’ time is hard enough. Imagine predicting what it’s going to be in two hours or two days or two weeks.”

He added: “You’ve probably heard some of those old wives’ tales and most of them are not true. Some of them are: ‘red sky at night, shepherd’s delight’ is quite true. Another good one is ‘rain before seven, fine by eleven’. That’s generally about right because a weather front is normally about two or three hours long. So if it’s raining at seven it’s likely to be clear by eleven.”

Kirkwood, a forecaster and former

contestant, added that the old wives’ tale about cows lying down when it is about to rain was less accurate. “We did an experiment on cows, and it turns out they’re just lazy,” she said.

The pair appeared at an event to speak about what happens behind the scenes at the BBC weather centre.

Speaking of his casual dress code, in which he has worn jeans and no tie on air, Hammond said Sunday evenings were “quite a pantomime affair” as he dressed up and down between

and news bulletins. “There are windows there and people walking by can see what’s going on,” he said. “We’re not following [dress code] orders. It’s just that it would seem odd, would it not, if we appeared half way through wearing a suit?”