METARs - Have It Your Way! The METAR is the standard aviation routine weather report. The name METAR is a contraction derived from the French for "aviation routine weather report". A typical METAR report contains data for the temperature, dew point, wind, precipitation, cloud cover, cloud heights, visibility, and barometric pressure. A METAR may also contain information on precipitation amounts, lightning, and other information that is of interest to pilots. The classic METAR format is condensed enough to display easily on the small screen of a typical cell phone. However, the METAR's cryptic string of data and abbreviations for weather conditions can be baffling to new pilots, and even sometimes puzzling to oldtimers when abbreviations for uncommon weather conditions are encountered. AvWx.net presents METARs in the classic abbreviated format, but provides a one-click translation into plain English if you wish. So if your puzzled by something like: METAR KPIT 240551Z 24003KT 6SM BR SCT085 BKN110 16/14 A2999 RMK AO2 SLP155 60032 T01610144 10222 20156 53006 Simply click on the Decode METAR link and AvWx.net will show you the report in plain English. So even obscure METAR abbreviations like BR, which means "mist" are easy to read, like this: METAR: KPIT (PITTSBURGH, PA, US) observed 0551 UTC 24 April 2007 Temp: 16.1°C (61°F) Dewpt: 14.4°C (58°F) [RH = 90%] Alt: 29.99 inches Hg (1015.7 mb) [Sea-level pressure: 1015.5 mb] Winds: from the WSW (240 degrees) at 3 MPH (3 knots; 1.6 m/s) Vis: 6 miles (10 km) Ceiling: 11000 feet AGL Clouds: scattered clouds at 8500 feet AGL broken clouds at 11000 feet AGL Wx: BR  (mist)