Many a meteorological reputation has perished on the rock of long-range forecasting. Some miscalculations are more serious than others.
Few bad forecasts, however, have had such profound consequences as that provided by the climatologists of the Reichswett erdienst - the weather service of the Third Reich, to Adolf Hitler in the early summer of 1941.
The German weathermen, on somewhat meagre evidence by today's standards, had concluded that no more than two severe winters ever occurred in succession. Since those of 1939 - 40 and 1940-41 had been severe in Europe, they reckoned a third one quite impossible. The winter of 1941-42, the Fuehrer was assured, was certain to be mild.
Thus it was that in June 1941, the German army set its sights on Moscow and followed in the footsteps of Napoleon's Grand Armee that had invaded Russia 130 years before. And like Napoleon's troops, for a time the Germans seemed invincible.
They had problems in October, when their accoutrements were virtually immobilised by mud; the so-called Schlamm Periode or "mud period", known to the Soviets as the rasputiza is a regular feature of the Russian springs and autumns.
But the thrust on Moscow, code-named Typhoon, was otherwise successful, and by the beginning of December, German Panzer units stood only 30 kilometres from the Soviet capital.
But then the cold. In the first seven days of December, the Moscow morning temperature fell an unbelievable 28 C from 1to 29. Although not unprecedented, a drop of this magnitude is rare; the German climatologists, on being told of the dramatic drop and asked if they still stood by their forecasts, declared: "The observations must be wrong."
But wrong they certainly were not. The Russians, better able to cope with these severe conditions, took their opportunity and began the counter-offensive that was ultimately to take them to Berlin.
The German army, on the other hand, lacked the essential warm clothing, since Hitler had believed the offensive would be over before the onset of the Russian winter. Many of the German weapons, tanks and mechanised vehicles ceased to function in the bitter cold.
So 58 years ago today, on December 8th, 1941, Hitler was obliged to turn his back on Moscow and begin a prolonged and ignominious retreat from Soviet soil.
As it happened, the winter of 1941-42 turned out to be one of the severest known in Russia, and was comparable to Napoleon's fateful year of 1812.
It facilitated the slow but steady Russian advance westwards, which laid the foundations of the political future of eastern Europe for the succeeding half a century.