Philip Avery (born 15 November 1959) is a British

meteorologist A meteorologist is a scientist who studies and works in the field of meteorology aiming to understand or predict Earth's atmospheric phenomena including the weather. Those who study meteorological phenomena are meteorologists in research, while t ...

and

BBC Weather BBC Weather is the department of the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) responsible for both the preparation and the broadcasting of weather forecasts. On 6 February 2018, BBC Weather changed supplier from the government Met Office to Mete ...

forecaster.

Career

After his initial training with the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...

, Avery spent time at a naval air station before joining a helicopter squadron embarked in

HMS Ark Royal Five ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS ''Ark Royal'': * , the flagship of the English fleet during the Spanish Armada campaign of 1588 * , planned as freighter, built as seaplane carrier during the First World War, renamed ''Pegasu ...

. Over the following two years he forecasting across the world, after which he joined a

Search and Rescue Search and rescue (SAR) is the search for and provision of aid to people who are in distress or imminent danger. The general field of search and rescue includes many specialty sub-fields, typically determined by the type of terrain the search ...

squadron, based at

Prestwick Prestwick ( gd, Preastabhaig) is a town in South Ayrshire on the west coast of Ayrshire in Scotland about southwest of Glasgow. It adjoins the larger town of Ayr to the south on the Firth of Clyde coast, the centre of which is about south, an ...

in Scotland. Within four years, he completed his time in the Navy and achieved an

MBA A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

. He helped to launch

The Weather Network The Weather Network (TWN) is a Television in Canada, Canadian English language, English-language weather information specialty channel available in Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom. It delivers weather information on television, ...

, a 24-hour cable-channel based in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

, before moving to London to work with the Weather Channel. After a year he joined the

BBC Weather Centre BBC Weather is the department of the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) responsible for both the preparation and the broadcasting of weather forecasting, weather forecasts. On 6 February 2018, BBC Weather changed supplier from the governme ...

, in April 1998, becoming a household name appearing regularly on

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadca ...

BBC World News BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and S ...

BBC Red Button BBC Red Button is a brand used for digital interactive television services provided by the BBC, and broadcast in the United Kingdom. The services replaced Ceefax, the BBC's analogue teletext service. BBC Red Button's text services were due to cl ...

BBC Radio 2 BBC Radio 2 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It is the most popular station in the United Kingdom with over 15 million weekly listeners. Since launching in 1967, the station broadcasts a wide range of content. ...

BBC Radio 5 Live BBC Radio 5 Live is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that broadcasts mainly news, sport, discussion, interviews and phone-ins. It is the principal BBC radio station covering sport in the United Kingdom, broadcast ...

and

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...

, where he was a regular forecaster on the ''

Today Today (archaically to-day) may refer to: * Day of the present, the time that is perceived directly, often called ''now'' * Current era, present * The current calendar date Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Today'' (1930 film), a 1930 A ...

'' programme. He previously forecast on the ''

BBC News at Ten ''BBC News at Ten'' formerly known as the ''BBC Ten O'Clock News'' or the ''Ten O'Clock News'' is the flagship evening news programme for the BBC News channel and British television channel BBC One on weekdays and Sundays at 10:00pm. Huw Edwa ...

'', the ''

BBC News at Six The ''BBC News at Six'' is the evening news programme bulletin from the BBC. Produced by BBC News, the programme is broadcast on the BBC News (TV channel), BBC News channel and on British television channel BBC One on weekdays at 6:00pm. For a ...

'' and the ''

BBC News at One The ''BBC News at One'' is the afternoon/lunchtime news bulletin from the BBC. Produced by BBC News, the programme is broadcast on BBC One and the BBC News (TV channel), BBC News channel (via British Sign Language) from Monday to Sunday at 1:00p ...

''. He took time out from presenting between September 2004 and July 2005 to take part in the

Global Challenge The Global Challenge (not to be confused with Global Challenge Award) was a round the world yacht race run by Challenge Business, the company started by Sir Chay Blyth in 1989. It was held every four years, and took a fleet of one-design steel y ...

2004-2005 yacht race. In October 2010 it was announced that Avery would no longer be presenting BBC weather forecasts. Despite this, he returned to broadcasting on the BBC a few years later. Avery has since presented weather for BBC's ''

Gardeners' World ''Gardeners' World'' is a long-running British gardening programme, first broadcast on 5 January 1968. The 2022 series is the 53rd. Its first series was presented by Ken Burras and came from Oxford Botanical Gardens. Up until 2020 most of its e ...

'' and is now a regular presenter on BBC One.

Personal life

Although from a

West Country The West Country (occasionally Westcountry) is a loosely defined area of South West England, usually taken to include all, some, or parts of the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Somerset, Bristol, and, less commonly, Wiltshire, Gloucesters ...

family, Avery was born in

Dunfermline Dunfermline (; sco, Dunfaurlin, gd, Dùn Phàrlain) is a city, parish and former Royal Burgh, in Fife, Scotland, on high ground from the northern shore of the Firth of Forth. The city currently has an estimated population of 58,508. Accord ...

, Scotland when his father was posted to Scotland with the

References

External links

BBC Weather profile
1959 births Living people BBC weather forecasters BBC World News People from Dunfermline Alumni of Keele University {{climate-bio-stub