A 14-year-old boy has become the youngest person to pass a test for certified weather forecasters.
Satoru Okajima, a second-grader at Nada Junior High School in Kobe, passed the test in January at an age of 14 years and 1 month, breaking the previous record set in August by a boy of 14 years and eight months, the examiner said Friday.
"I'm simply happy," Okajima told reporters at the school in Higashi-Nada Ward, Kobe. "My friends were surprised because they didn't know what I was studying.
"Weather forecasts are difficult to understand," he said. "That's why I want to do forecasting that's easy to comprehend."
Okajima's mother, Natsuko, 42, said, "Satoru has loved to write weather charts on maps since he was in nursery school."
She said he stared taking meteorologist exams in elementary school and hopes to become a scientist.
The Japan Meteorological Business Support Center in Tokyo launched the test in 1994 and holds it twice a year.
In January, 4,555 people took the test, and 262 were successful -- a pass rate of 5.8 percent. The oldest successful candidate was aged 66.
The average age of those who passed was 35.5 years.