Shipping Forecast

The Shipping Forecast is a BBC Radio broadcast of weather reports and forecasts for the seas around the British Isles. It is produced by the Met Office and broadcast by BBC Radio 4 on behalf of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. The forecast dates back over 150 years. There are currently two or three broadcasts per day, at 00:48, 05:34, and 17:54 UK local time. It was first broadcast on BBC Radio on 4 July 1925.
In the forecast, the waters around the British Isles are divided into 31 sea areas, also known as weather areas. The forecast begins by listing areas with gale warnings, followed by a general synopsis of pressure areas, then a forecast for each individual sea area covering wind speed and direction, precipitation, and visibility. Extended forecasts at 00:48 and 05:34 include information from coastal weather stations and an inshore waters forecast.
The unique and distinctive presentation style of these broadcasts has led to their attracting an audience much wider than that directly interested in maritime weather conditions. It is frequently referred to and parodied in British popular culture.

History

The Shipping Forecast was established by Vice-Admiral Robert FitzRoy, the first professional weather forecaster, captain of and founder of the Met Office. In October 1859, the steam clipper Royal Charter was wrecked in a strong storm off Anglesey; 450 people lost their lives. In response to this loss, FitzRoy introduced a warning service for shipping in February 1861, using telegraph communications. This remained the United Kingdom's Met Office primary responsibility for some time afterward. In 1911, the Met Office began issuing marine weather forecasts which included gale and storm warnings via radio transmission for areas around the British Isles. This service was discontinued during and following the First World War, between 1914 and June 1921, and again during the Second World War between 1939 and 1945.
The programme, then called Weather Shipping, first took the form of a radio broadcast on 1 January 1924 in Morse Code over the Air Ministry's radio station. From 4 July 1925, it has been transmitted as a spoken word broadcast by the BBC.
Today, although most ships have onboard technology to provide the Forecast's information, they still use it to check their data.
On Friday 30 May 2014, for the first time in more than 90 years, BBC Radio 4 failed to broadcast the Shipping Forecast at 0520. Staff at Broadcasting House were reading out the report but it was not transmitted. Listeners instead heard BBC World Service.
The 150th anniversary of the shipping forecast was on 24 August 2017, while the 100th anniversary of the BBC's version was on 4 July 2025.
Between 30 March 2020 and 5 July 2020, as a result of emergency rescheduling because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of bulletins a day was reduced to three, at 00:48, 05:33, and either 12:03 or 17:54.

Broadcast times and frequencies

From 1 April 2024, there is no longer a separate long wave schedule for Radio 4, so the number of broadcasts per day has been reduced to two on weekdays and three at weekends, at the following times. They can be received on long wave, FM, DAB, Sky, Freeview, Freesat, Virgin Media and online via BBC Sounds.

00:48. Includes weather reports from an extended list of coastal stations at 00:52 and an inshore waters forecast at 00:55 and concludes with a brief UK weather outlook for the coming day. The broadcast finishes at approximately 00:58.
05:34. Includes weather reports from coastal stations at 05:38, and an inshore waters forecast at 05:40.
17:54.

The forecasts are read by the duty announcer. Until 23 March 2025, the 05:20 forecast was read by the weather forecaster.
Until 31 March 2024, there were four broadcasts per day at the following times:

00:48 – transmitted on FM and LW.
05:20 – transmitted on FM and LW.
12:01 – normally transmitted on LW only.
17:54 – transmitted only on LW on weekdays, as an opt-out from the PM programme, but at weekends transmitted on both FM and LW.
Longwave

The Shipping Forecast has been broadcast on BBC longwave radio services so the signal can be received clearly at sea all around the British Isles, regardless of time of day or radio conditions. The forecast was broadcast on the BBC National Programme until September 1939, and then after the Second World War on the BBC Light Programme until November 1978. When BBC Radio 4 took over the longwave frequency from Radio 2 on 23 November 1978, the Shipping Forecast was moved to Radio 4 to keep it broadcasting on longwave.
As part of the BBC's plans to switch off BBC Radio 4 longwave transmissions, it reduced daily broadcasts of the Shipping Forecast to the FM simulcast schedule of twice on weekdays and three times on weekends in April 2024.

Online

The Shipping Forecast is published online by the Met Office and the BBC. It is also available on BBC Sounds.

Television broadcasts

On 18 December 1993, as part of the Arena Radio Night, BBC Radio 4 and BBC 2 collaborated on a one off simulcast so the shipping forecast – read that night by Laurie Macmillan – could be seen as well as heard. To date, it is the only time that it has been broadcast on television.

Region names

The 31 sea areas covered in the forecast are as shown in this table and map. The forecast follows the order shown, going clockwise around the British Isles, with each area except Trafalgar, Irish Sea, Shannon, and Fair Isle bordering the previous. Trafalgar is included only in the 00:48 forecast, except when gales or more are due there.

Order	Name	Origin of Name
1	Viking	Viking Bank
2	North Utsire	Utsira
3	South Utsire	Utsira
4	Forties	Long Forties
5	Cromarty	Cromarty Firth
6	Forth	Firth of Forth
7	Tyne	Tyne Estuary
8	Dogger	Dogger Bank
9	Fisher	Fisher Bank
10	German Bight	German Bight
11	Humber	Humber
12	Thames	Thames Estuary
13	Dover	Dover
14	Wight	Isle of Wight
15	Portland	Isle of Portland
16	Plymouth	Plymouth
17	Biscay	Bay of Biscay
18	Trafalgar	Cape Trafalgar
19	FitzRoy	After Robert FitzRoy
20	Sole	Sole Bank
21	Lundy	Lundy
22	Fastnet	Fastnet Rock
23	Irish Sea	Irish Sea
24	Shannon	Shannon Estuary
25	Rockall	Rockall / Rockall Basin
26	Malin	Malin Head
27	Hebrides	Hebrides
28	Bailey	Bill Bailey's Bank
29	Fair Isle	Fair Isle
30	Faeroes	Faroe Islands
31	Southeast Iceland	Iceland

These areas still largely follow the format of the chart adopted in 1949. In 1955, meteorologists from countries bordering the North Sea met and recommended the following changes: that the area Heligoland be renamed German Bight, to conform with the name generally used by other countries; that a new area, Fisher, be split off from the north-eastern half of Dogger; that a new area, Viking, be split off from the northern half of Forties; and that the area Iceland be renamed Southeast Iceland to clarify its position. After international consultation, these were adopted in 1956. In August 1984, to conform with common North Sea area boundaries agreed upon by neighbouring countries, the areas North Utsire and South Utsire were created. In 2002, the area Finisterre was renamed FitzRoy, to avoid confusion with a different area called Finisterre used by the Spanish meteorological service.
The sea areas match the forecast areas used by other North Sea countries, though some names differ. The Dutch KNMI and Norwegian counterpart names Forties the Fladen Ground, while Météo-France uses Pas-de-Calais for Dover, Cap d'Antifer for Wight, Casquets for Portland and Ouessant for Plymouth.

Coastal weather stations

The coastal weather stations named in the Shipping Forecast are:

The inshore waters forecast uses the following coastal areas of the United Kingdom:

Cape Wrath – Rattray Head including Orkney
Rattray Head – Berwick-upon-Tweed
Berwick-upon-Tweed – Whitby
Whitby – Gibraltar Point
Gibraltar Point – North Foreland
North Foreland – Selsey Bill
Selsey Bill – Lyme Regis
Lyme Regis – Land's End including the Isles of Scilly
Land's End – St David's Head including the Bristol Channel
St David's Head – Great Orme Head including St George's Channel
Great Orme Head – Mull of Galloway
Isle of Man
Lough Foyle – Carlingford Lough
Mull of Galloway – Mull of Kintyre including the Firth of Clyde and the North Channel
Mull of Kintyre – Ardnamurchan Point
Ardnamurchan Point – Cape Wrath
Shetland Isles