Two years ago – Pakistan’s first weather blog emerged!

It was a pleasant spring day on March 6, 2011, the sky was partially clouded with occasional sea breeze. Surfing through the internet during the afternoon, I was looking for some websites that would tell only tell about Pakistan’s weather and climate. To my utter surprise  there was no weather blog that would highlight the weather neither on Facebook or any other platform.

There were few foreign websites that gave few updates about Pakistan but they were mostly incomplete and those updates were published once a month, in short I was referred back to the weather blogs of America, India or United Arab Emirates, this was embarrassing for a country of 187 million. Out of my patience I knew that something was missing from the Internet, every country has blogs that give information about different walks of life therefore taking this step was not necessary but mandatory.

The Creation 

A blog that would focus on anything related on weather of the country and sometimes the world – Pakistan Weather Portal (PWP) was made at 4:00 pm on March 6, 2011. It was a small blog at first that used to give micro updates but in few days it started giving detailed articles related to any story related to weather myths, history, geography etc.

Rise to Fame and Achievements

To my surprise in just few months,  PWP started coming on Google’s search and in no time we were being mentioned everywhere. The Portal’s achievements are mentioned below;

1. Washington Post, one of the most popular newspaper of the world, mentioned PWP’s article on the outbreak of  Peacock disease. (check here)
2. The Nation, a Pakistani newspaper, took some paragraphs from PWP’s article on Karachi’s dust storm. (check here)
3. The Global Warming Foundation, an American website that focuses on Global Warming, highlighted PWP’s heat wave article. (Check here)
4. Siasat, a forum that discusses the political situation of Pakistan, mentioned PWP’s article on Karachi’s dust storm. (check here).
5. Focal Points, a blog run by a foreigner, mentioned Monsoon of Pakistan. (Check here)
6. Bharat Rakshak, a forum that discusses the military situation of India, mentioned PWP’s article on Dust storm in Peshawar. (Check here)
7. Homeopathy World Community, a group website that looks after the victims of natural disaster, mentioned the Weather patterns in Pakistan by PWP. (Check here)
8. Muscat Daily, a famous newspaper in Oman has mentioned PWP many times. (check here)
9. Oman now, a news website mentioned PWP in November. (check here)
10. Pakistan fisherfolk, a group that looks after the safety and their welfare, followed every update of PWP regarding the expected cyclone. They mentioned us on their Facebook page and Twitter page. (Check here and here)
11. Pakistan Red crescent society, PRCS is a humanitarian organization, dedicated to improving lives of vulnerable segments of the society, PRCS has mentioned PWP on their monsoon updates. (check here)
12. Humanitarian Response of Pakistan has mentioned PWP in their monsoon updates. (check here)
13. Climate Himalaya, a website led by south Asian users highlighted PWP’s Green Revolution in November 2011. (check here)
14. Jinn Org, a site about demons and supernatural beings mentioned Seraiki myth – Dust storms are possessed by Demons! in April 2012. (check here)
15. World Weather Post, a website that collects the best articles related to weather from all around the world has mentioned PWP many times. PWP’s tropical coverage remained on top for 5 continuous week on that website, beating BBC, CNN, Reuter and Hindustan times. (check here)
16. PWP is also mentioned on many international forums and blogs from Manila to New york. PWP’s tropical coverage was translated by many Omanis in Arabic and they followed us hour by hour (check some of these here)
17. PWP is also mentioned on many Facebook and twitter pages of different people around the world.

The Purpose – To create awareness

It was my aim to create awareness among Pakistanis about the dangers of nature and climate change hence it was important for me to create such a platform. PWP gave daily weather updates and created 300+ since March 6, 2011 which included weather, climate, space, enviroment related articles to give Pakistanis all this on one platform.

• Thus today we have achieved our first aim as of 2012!

Pakistan Weather Portal (PWP) has now created an independent weather community in Pakistan that was never seen before in Pakistan. People can now share their views, information with each other and stay in touch with the latest weather development in the country especially during monsoon and storms. We have spread the weather of Pakistan across the global

• In 2013, we have achieved our second aim as well!

Inspiration from others

I have mentioned this before and I will mention it again, It was Mr.Ahmed’s blog from Dubai, UAE that inspired me to create this blog and Rajesh Kapadia’s blog whose friendship with PWP is a lesson for Indo-Pak Relations.

Thanks to PWP Fans

It is because of the PWP-Readers that this Portal is still alive and I would love to thank all of them for running this blog. Few names that I remember are mentioned below;

• Ahmed Zafar and Shoaib Daniel – They have been a loyal supporters of PWP since its creation.
• Demon – I dont know his original name but he was the first person to visit this blog and that is something that you don’t forget.
• Shoaib Iqbal – A regular visitor of the Portal and always share his views which are always welcomed.
• Waseem Ahmed – Many times he has shared his weather experience with me through emails.
• Tarim (fragnat1c) – A regular visitor during the monsoon season.
• Umar Khan and Daniyal – I always wanted people of Punjab to take interest in PWP therefore I am happy to see them doing so.
• Yousuf Tahir – I cannot thank this person enough, the image and logo of PWP you see today is because of him.
  

Other sites related to Pakistan Weather Portal (PWP)

In the year 2012, PWP introduced Pakistan’s first weather Youtube channel, a sign of success. We will expand more in the coming months and years.

The Portal will remain with you!

Today is the second anniversary of Pakistan Weather Portal (PWP), the blog had another amazing year and journey with the people of the world and we are looking forward in doing so for the third year. Keeping the mood of the people in mind, PWP will continue its aim in spreading the word of climate change, possibly the biggest upcoming threat for Pakistan! In the end, we should pray for the stability of our country as it is the only home we have. Pakistan Zindabad!