Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) says it is “moving quickly” to improve its newly updated website after the federal government pushed the weather agency to make changes amid a storm of complaints from end users.

The new website — the BoM’s first major revamp in 12 years, at a cost of $4.1 million — went live on Wednesday 22 October and quickly drew criticism from some users for its modern redesign, navigation changes, and new radar colour scale.

The update occurred just as severe weather events took place in several states, and changes to the site left some power users such as farmers and fishers unable to quickly find the detailed weather data they relied on.

“You now have a completely unusable layout, no wind speed, direction, temperature, humidity,” wrote one social media user about changes to their local weather radar.

Some users of the BoM mobile apps also reported issues with their mobile app widgets following the website update.

Minister for the Environment and Water, Murray Watt, said he requested a meeting with BoM’s acting CEO Dr Peter Stone on Tuesday, in which he told Stone the agency should “consider this feedback and, where appropriate, adjust the website’s settings as soon as possible”.

“This includes urgent consideration of improvements to the website’s functionality and useability,” said Watt, who argued the new BOM website was “not meeting many users’ expectations”.

The minister said he also asked the Bureau to brief state and territory emergency services ministers on its new website this week, as well as the steps being taken to improve it.

“This follows previous work by the Bureau to brief a range of stakeholders, including emergency management agencies,” he said.

“Australians deserve to have confidence in these important services.”

Update timing ‘not ideal’

The timing of BoM’s website update was criticised by some users and weather experts.

Minister Watt said the site was “a critical tool to ensure public safety”, especially over the so-called Higher-Risk Weather Season (HRWS) between October and April when bushfires, heatwaves, flooding, and tropical cyclones were more likely.

Experts and members of the public voiced concerns that some radars on the new BoM website exhibited signs of lagging or missing data, and argued its adjusted colour scale did not highlight the true severity of storms which hit Brisbane and Melbourne on Monday.

Steve Turton, an adjunct professor of environmental geography at CQUniversity, wrote, “Launching a major update at the start of the spring storm season and during a record-breaking heatwave was not ideal.

“Better public communication and walk-throughs could have helped make these changes easier.”

BoM previously stated it had carried out public beta testing of its new website for more than a year, which it said received “overwhelmingly positive feedback”.

The agency’s website receives millions of pageviews each day, and its old website remains accessible at a different URL at the time of writing.

While some links on the new BoM website still directed to pages on the old website, the agency said it would “gradually move specialist content from the ‘legacy’ website to the new website”.

BoM ‘moving quickly’ to make changes

The bureau was “moving quickly to act on the feedback received”, with updates slated for “the coming weeks”, Stone said in a statement on Wednesday.

He added that weather data had “not been compromised” by the launch of the new site, but acknowledged the negative feedback and apologised for “the challenges the change has caused”.

“It’s clear we need to do more to help people through the change, both by making adjustments to the website and by helping users to understand its new features,” Stone said.

“… The new site has been specifically designed to enhance access to public safety information.

“The Bureau's forecasts and warnings are now more prominent, easily accessible and relevant to your location.”

Stone added that the BoM website's weather radar provided only “one view of the current weather situation”.

“It is not intended to replicate or replace the Bureau's weather warnings which are created by our expert meteorologists and issued ahead of a severe weather event,” he said.

The BoM welcomed public feedback on its new site, said Stone, who added that users could submit feedback through the agency’s website, or get help on its dedicated website help page or by calling 1300 754 389.