The World - News from Jan. 31, 1988

An official report has attacked British weathermen for not giving an earlier warning of the nation’s worst storms in 300 years, which killed about 20 people in October, the Sunday Times of London said. It said the report blamed Meteorological Office staff for incompetence by failing to interpret data properly and relying too heavily on computers. Weathermen had warned of the storm’s intensity only hours before the hurricane-force winds began lashing southern England, causing up to $529 million in damage. They had maintained that the storm was a freak and blamed a lack of weather observation ships for not giving them an early warning.