HKO adds real-time weather photos at Central and enhances urban-scale meteorological observation and forecast

13 December 2023

The Hong Kong Observatory has added real-time weather photos at the Hong Kong Maritime Museum (HKMM) at Central Pier, as well as the observation and forecast of temperature and relative humidity from the urban meteorological monitoring station at HKMM to the Observatory’s website today (December 13). This facilitates public’s understanding of the latest weather conditions over Central and the Victoria Harbour.

The newly added weather camera enjoys a wide view towards the east, capturing the sea fog affecting the Victoria Harbour, and weather such as showers and thunderstorms approaching from the east (Figure 1 in the Annex). Special weather phenomena over the Victoria Harbour can also be observed under suitable atmospheric conditions. For example, the camera once captured an optical phenomenon called “corona” in August this year (Figure 2 in the Annex). The public can access the weather photos from the new camera on the “Regional Weather in Hong Kong” webpage. The new photos will soon be available in the mobile application "MyObservatory" as well.

In addition, the “Automatic Regional Weather Forecast in Hong Kong & Pearl River Delta Region” webpage was also enhanced with the spot at the HKMM. It uses temperature and relative humidity observations collected from the urban meteorological monitoring station at the museum, as well as data from numerical weather prediction models to generate hourly forecasts of air temperature and relative humidity for the next three days (Figure 3 in the Annex). This allows the public to gain better access to more detailed weather changes around Central.

Figure 1 The Hong Kong Observatory has added real-time weather photos at the Hong Kong Maritime Museum at Central Pier today (December 13). The newly added weather camera has a wide field of view looking towards the east, facilitating the observation of weather affecting the areas around the Victoria Harbour (The distance between each location and the camera is shown in unit of kilometre. The weather photo was taken at around 5pm on July 13, 2023).

Figure 2 At around 7pm on August 17, 2023, the weather camera captured the “corona” (indicated by the arrow). When sunlight is diffracted by small water droplets or ice particles in thin clouds, one or more sequences of coloured rings centred around the Sun, forming a “corona”.

Figure 3 The “Automatic Regional Weather Forecast in Hong Kong & Pearl River Delta Region” service was enhanced with observations and forecasts of temperature and relative humidity at the urban meteorological monitoring station at the Hong Kong Maritime Museum.