"NOBODY likes to be ridiculed, but for some people it can become a
matter of life and death. Take Robert FitzRoy, the founding father of
the UK's Meteorological Office and captain of the Beagle during Charles
Darwin's five-year voyage. A keen amateur forecaster, he
enthusiastically applied the science of his day to weather prediction.
Much good did it do him. Instead of hailing his tentative
prognostications as a useful first step, politicians, newspapers and
other scientists harangued and mocked FitzRoy whenever he got it wrong.
Depression quickly set in, to fatal effect. One Sunday morning in 1865,
FitzRoy cut his throat in despair.

These days, most meteorologists have got used to being the target of
jokes. The criticisms are the same, though. People expect weather
forecasts to be accurate. In this age of weather-forecasting
supercomputers and 24-hour satellite surveillance, what's more, those
expectations of accuracy have risen to new heights. ...

The complete article is 2568 words long."

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