I added more than 4000 weather stations and it wasn't easy...

This month, I reached an important milestone by integrating the MADIS (Meteorological Assimilation Data Ingest System) network into Let's Kite. This global meteorological database centralizes American NOAA stations as well as many other international providers, representing an impressive total of approximately 200,000 stations across the globe.

The challenge of abundance

With so much data available, the real challenge was to remain relevant. Displaying 200,000 stations would have made the interface unusable for our kitesurfer users. I therefore developed an intelligent filtering system that only retains truly useful stations:

- Stations located within 10km of a kitesurfing spot
- Weather readings less than an hour old

This filtering brings the number of active MADIS stations down to approximately 4,000, bringing the total number of stations available on Let's Kite to more than 10,000 during peak hours. This number naturally fluctuates depending on the time of day, as not all stations have continuous readings.

The joys of technical integration

The implementation proved more complex than expected – it sometimes seems like meteorological services deliberately erect technical barriers to discourage the use of their data! Fortunately, as a good 2025 developer, I was able to count on AI to support me during the most challenging moments.

The result? A much denser weather coverage that will allow kitesurfers, wingfoilers and parawingos to make even more informed decisions for their sessions.