Artificial intelligence is already helping to predict wind and low cloud at Madeira Airport, according to University of Madeira researcher Décio Alves, who spoke at MadIT – Madeira Innovation Talks 2026 at the Madeira Congress Centre in Funchal.
The team extended its work to fog and low cloud, which can also disrupt flights. Using data from Europe's latest-generation weather satellites, the researchers built a low-cloud forecasting model that is already used at the airport. Alves said the group is the only research team in the world using this type of satellite imagery to predict cloud cover around airports.
For about two months over the summer, an AI system ran alongside meteorologists at 14 Portuguese airports, without their knowledge, so its performance could be compared. The results presented show 97% accuracy for human forecasters and 99% for the AI, with the biggest difference in identifying and correcting errors.
