"Do not take us for idiots." - updated with meteorologist resignation

Meteorologist resigns, citing PTSD from threats over climate change coverage

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/06/22/meteorologist-climate-death-threat-iowa/

 

I don’t think anyone should be harassed or threatened but anyone who cannot see the reporting of weather is overdramatized today is not paying attention.

 

True, and it even gets a little more nuanced than that!

https://www.weather.gov/media/pah/WeatherEducation/pop.pdf

 

What I see more often than that is when severe weather does happen and people complain that they weren't given enough notice. The media will sometimes characterize a severe weather event as having been a surprise as if it came out of nowhere or report that people only had a couple minutes to act. I've seen these things happen even when the events were forecasted days in advance. As a weather nerd, I can't count the number of times I've texted or called someone with severe weather approaching and they were completely oblivious. There is only so much that meteorologists can do if people aren't going to pay attention.

 

Severe weather can be pretty dramatic.

 

I think people may find this interesting.

Against the Rules With Michael Lewis
Guest - James Spann

 

I was referring to the daily reports. As a lifelong Floridian we have had summer thunderstorms most every day going back as far as anyone can remember. Yet if you listen to the knuckleheads on the daily report you would think you were going to die this afternoon. I guess they just like scaring the older people. My mother is a Floridian for 65 years. Didn’t use to get concerned about anything but hurricanes and tornado warnings. Now Channel 9 Weather scares the heck out of her and her friends all summer.

I agree that they generally do an excellent job leading up to hurricanes and tornado bands. You really can’t be too careful with those.

 

The Earth's getting hotter and the oceans are boiling, so the storms are more intense in Florida than they used to be. For example, the average rain amount in a Florida thunderstorm was only 1.79 inches in 1980, but today it's upwards of 1.83 inches per thunderstorm. Florida now has 3,523 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes per day. That's down from 3,530 lightning strikes per day in 2010, but in 1980, it was only 3,489 lightning strikes per day. Combine all this with the 3.8 inches the sea has risen since 1991 and you can see there is a lot to stress out about.

 

Al Gore Nails 5 Key Climate Predictions he made in 2006

 

It's a tough balancing act for them. In Pensacola, our tv weather guy goes out of his way to be calm and not scare people during severe weather events - even in tornado warnings.
Of course, even when we do get tornadoes around here, they aren't typically as large or violent as they can get in other places. We had several warnings last week and at least one touched down that was given an EF2 rating. The only death I read about was a man who had a tree come through his roof.

My mom seems to have gotten more anxious about bad weather in recent years, and I suspect that might be common as people age? The tornado went very close to her house, and they rode it out in the closet. She handled it fine, but I doubt that experience is going to ease her nerves going forward, lol.

 

Holy crap!!! I had no idea of the impact!!!!

 

Unless it's a hurricane, tornado outbreak, or severe weather heading towards a bigger city, you're probably more likely to find re-runs of Ice Road Truckers or something.

 

Yeah, the Weather Channel sold out just like MTV did.

 

She did rack up the ratings, didn’t she?

 

I see what you did there. lolz

 

She’s a UF grad too.

 

Well we know stonybrook was /s

 

Useless without pics…