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WeatherBug for iOS has been revamped with better real-time lightning features
WeatherBug (free) has long been a top choice for people serious about weather. Yes, Yahoo Weather is beautiful and useful, but WeatherBug has always let you dig deeper into weather data. Now, Earth Networks has released an update with enhanced Spark Lightning detection. As before, you'll get a warning when lightning is less than 10 miles away, and now you can zoom out to see lighting anywhere in the world in real time. The look of the map has been improved over earlier versions, too. The company claims its Total Lightning Network is the most advanced system in the world, and it's used by NASA, the National Weather Service and the U.S. Air Force. This latest version now lets you share lightning info with others. Other changes include expansed user-submitted galleries, a cold and flu section, and additions to what are called Lifestyle Forecasts. That includes golf forecasts, outdoor nature forecasts, pollen alerts, and a national flu update. You also get hourly and 10-day forecasts, plus a variety of weather map overlays for radar, clouds, wind speed, pressure, humidity, wind chill and heat index. WeatherBug's look is still a bit busy, but now it lets you choose background colors or a background picture. There are pop-up ads that show up at the bottom of the screen. I looked around for lightning, but when I checked there was nothing going on in the U.S. There were some pretty active storms in South America, and WeatherBug displayed the lightning flashes as they happened. WeatherBug now supports 64 bit operation, and requires iOS 6.1 or later. It's a universal app and it's optimized for the iPhone 5.
