What goes into the range weather score?

The score combines sustained wind, precipitation, temperature with wind chill or humidex, gust spread, and visibility using a fixed rubric. Density altitude and available wind-aloft readings provide additional context; they are not score components. Verify conditions at the range.

What is density altitude and why does it matter for shooting?

Density altitude expresses air density as an equivalent altitude in the standard atmosphere. Higher density altitude means lower air density and generally less aerodynamic drag. The effect on trajectory depends on your equipment and distance; use a ballistic solver rather than a fixed drop estimate. This page computes density altitude from station pressure and ambient temperature.

Why use station pressure rather than sea-level pressure?

The density-altitude formula uses pressure at the location. Sea-level pressure has been adjusted for elevation and cannot be substituted directly. These readings come from a weather model and may differ from an on-site instrument.

What does the shootability score measure?

It is a weighted geometric mean of five hourly components: sustained wind (28 percent), precipitation rate and condition (30 percent), temperature with wind-chill or humidex (18 percent), gust spread above sustained wind (12 percent), and visibility (12 percent). Precipitation is weighted just above wind because for most outdoor shooting and archery rain is a binary go / no-go gate, while wind degrades a session and rain ends it. A weakest-link cap pulls the headline down to MARGINAL when any single component is catastrophic, and a severe-weather override pins the headline to POOR for confirmed lightning, hail, freezing rain, blizzard, or violent shower.

How is severe weather gated so the score does not flag every unstable afternoon?

WMO codes 95 / 96 / 99 (thunderstorm) on forecast hours mean 'thunderstorm conditions possible in this grid cell during this period', not 'thundering on you right now'. The severe-weather override suppresses itself for those codes unless the same hour reports non-trace precipitation or a precipitation probability of 50 percent or higher. The STORM RISK chip requires three concurrent afternoon signals (CAPE at or above 1,500 J/kg, lifted index at or below -3 K, and a model precipitation probability at or above 30 percent) before it appears.

Is the page free, and can a club embed the same data on its own site?

Yes. Every range page is free to read, and clubs and ranges can add the iframe at /embed/atmospherics/ to WordPress, Wix, Squarespace, Webflow, or Shopify. It requires no API key, JavaScript installation, or account, and uses the same scoring engine as the public range page.

How often does the data refresh?

Live weather is pulled from Open-Meteo (CC BY 4.0) and cached per-range for 15 minutes with single-flight coalescing and stale-while-revalidate, so ten visitors arriving in the same minute trigger one upstream call. The 24-hour forecast strip and the TOMORROW summary run on the same cached payload, so the score on the headline, the strip, and the embed are always computed from the same numbers.

Range Atmospherics — Live Conditions for Recognised Shooting and Archery Ranges

Live wind, temperature, dewpoint, density altitude, pressure, and visibility for a curated directory of recognised outdoor shooting and archery ranges. Each range is scored 0-100 against a fixed five-component rubric (sustained wind, precipitation, temperature, gust spread, visibility) and classified into one of five named bands tuned for outdoor rifle and archery practice.

What is reported

Sustained wind speed and direction, gust speed, air temperature, computed dewpoint (Magnus-Tetens), relative humidity, station pressure, visibility, and computed density altitude (ICAO standard atmosphere, derived from station pressure and temperature) in feet and metres. Conditions update every 15 minutes from Open-Meteo.com.

Classification rubric

The 0-100 shootability score is a weighted geometric mean of five sub-scores: sustained wind (28%), precipitation rate and condition (30%), temperature with wind chill or humidex (18%), gust spread above sustained wind (12%), and visibility (12%). Outcome bands are fixed thresholds: 90 and above is OPTIMAL, 75-89 is GOOD, 50-74 is OK, 30-49 is MARGINAL, below 30 is POOR. A weakest-link rule caps the headline at MARGINAL when any single component is catastrophic; a severe-weather override forces POOR for lightning, hail, freezing rain, blizzard, or violent shower observations. The rubric is tuned for centerfire rifle past 300 yards and target archery; pistol, rimfire, and shotgun shooters can read the score one band more lenient.

Disclaimer. For information and entertainment only. No accuracy, fitness or safety guarantees are made. Verify conditions on the line before any shot.

Ranges currently indexed

382 shooting and archery ranges across 25 countries: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Lithuania, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, USA, United Kingdom. Per-range pages live at /atmospherics/<range-slug>; country index pages live at /atmospherics/country/<country-slug> for countries with two or more ranges.

Planning a range session

Review current weather, the next few hours, and tomorrow using the same conditions rubric. The underlying weather model comes from Open-Meteo and does not provide no claim of more accurate observations or forecasts than a national weather service. The summary includes:

At-a-glance go / no-go. A 0-100 conditions score and five bands (OPTIMAL, GOOD, OK, MARGINAL, POOR) summarize current and forecast weather. Use the underlying readings and local conditions when deciding whether to visit.
One score, one band, same rubric everywhere. Five components (sustained wind, precipitation, temperature with wind chill or humidex, gust spread, visibility) combined the same way across every indexed range, so a GOOD afternoon at one club is directly comparable to a GOOD afternoon at another.
Density altitude in feet and metres. Computed from station pressure and temperature at the range's reported elevation using the ICAO precise barometric formula.
Gust spread, not just gust speed. The delta between sustained wind and peak gust is what destabilises a shot; the rubric scores it explicitly.
Best window planner. The 24-hour forward-looking strip and tomorrow summary highlight the highest-scoring daylight hour and the longest contiguous block of daylight hours scoring GOOD or better — useful for planning a session, not just checking conditions right now.
Honest severe-weather handling. A weakest-link cap holds the headline at MARGINAL when any one component is catastrophic; a severe-weather override forces POOR for confirmed lightning, hail, freezing rain, blizzard, or violent shower observations. Forecast-risk codes (WMO 95/96/99) without measurable precipitation or meaningful probability are deliberately not treated as confirmed observations, so unstable spring afternoons aren't auto-flagged POOR.
Wind aloft, CAPE, lifted index, and air quality. Surfaced where the upstream model exposes them at the grid point — convective indicators feed a separate storm-risk chip; PM2.5, PM10, and UV are reported as raw values.
Curated to recognised outdoor ranges. Coordinates and elevation are verified per range, so the model is queried at the actual point rather than the nearest postcode centroid.
Embeddable on range websites. Each range page has a free iframe at /embed/atmospherics/<slug> with configurable colours — see embed-docs.

Genuine limitations are documented on methodology: the scoring is opinionated (rifle past 300 yards and target archery as the reference disciplines, so pistol and shotgun shooters can read the band one step more lenient), and a model grid cell is not a wind meter on the line. Verify on the line before any shot.

Weather data by Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), fetched on demand and cached for fifteen minutes per range.

Range Atmospherics — Live Conditions for Recognised Shooting and Archery Ranges

What is reported

Classification rubric

Ranges currently indexed

Planning a range session

Argentina (3)

Australia (17)

Austria (6)

Belgium (5)

Brazil (8)

Canada (115)

Chile (1)

Czech Republic (3)

France (5)

Germany (10)

Ireland (10)

Italy (7)

Japan (2)

Lithuania (1)

Mexico (1)

Netherlands (7)

New Zealand (19)

Norway (2)

Poland (7)

South Africa (3)

Spain (5)

Sweden (1)

Switzerland (5)

United Kingdom (9)

USA (130)