Shipping Forecast largely autobiographical account of growing up in Liverpool during the 1940s and 1950s, opens with a shipping forecast from this period. In an episode of the BBC sitcom "Keeping Up Appearances", a soon-to-be-sailing Hyacinth Bucket calls over the telephone for an advance shipping forecast, even though the yacht she and her husband Richard are to visit is moored on the Thames near Oxford. Names mentioned (in scene sequence) are: Fisher, German Bight and Cromarty, Dogger and Heligoland (also known as German Bight). In an episode of the BBC sitcom "Ever Decreasing Circles", Howard and Hilda leave their neighbour Paul's house
Shipping Forecast reading it. She finds his voice arousing. In the BBC sitcom "As Time Goes By", the character Mrs Bale is obsessed by and constantly mentions The Shipping Forecast much to the befuddlement of the other characters. Many characters in the 1983 children's cartoon, "The Adventures of Portland Bill" are named after features mentioned in the Shipping Forecast. In Funcom's massively multiplayer online role-playing game "The Secret World", the shipping forecast plays over the radio in a London Underground station, adding to the British flavour distinguishing the setting from other worldwide locations featured in the game. A number of minor characters