I received a note from a guy the other day who said he was on a business trip in Phoenix and wanted to let me know some guy out there was using my name on a radio weather report. I replied back that the guy who was using my name was actually me! Most people don’t know this, but our business called The Weather Company has a rather expansive network of over 20 radio affiliates around the nation in states like Texas, Louisiana, Arizona, Georgia, Florida, Virginia, and of course Alabama. The radio weather part of my day is actually rather time consuming; I usually spend at least three hours a day doing all of these weather forecasts. They are recorded digitally, and loaded to a central server that the various stations use to download their cuts. I have gotten pretty good at finding wi-fi “hot spots” do I can upload the radio files while on the road.
Times have really changed; back when I started doing radio weather in the late 70s it was all done over the telephone. I called the various stations, where the forecast was recorded on old reel to reel tape decks, or cart machines. I wound up doing radio weather cuts at places like phone booths and rest areas; wherever I could find a telephone I could use with some degree of privacy. I even did an entire radio weather feed from Six Flags over Georgia one afternoon!
Today the quality is excellent; most folks think I am at the radio station they are hearing when I do the weather. Most of the cuts are recorded on my laptop in places like the weather office at ABC 33/40, my home, the back of the Storm Chaser van, and hotel rooms when I am out of town. On a normal day, I crank out almost 100 weather cuts for the different stations for various dayparts. The nice thing is that I always look good on the radio!
Times have really changed; back when I started doing radio weather in the late 70s it was all done over the telephone. I called the various stations, where the forecast was recorded on old reel to reel tape decks, or cart machines. I wound up doing radio weather cuts at places like phone booths and rest areas; wherever I could find a telephone I could use with some degree of privacy. I even did an entire radio weather feed from Six Flags over Georgia one afternoon!
Today the quality is excellent; most folks think I am at the radio station they are hearing when I do the weather. Most of the cuts are recorded on my laptop in places like the weather office at ABC 33/40, my home, the back of the Storm Chaser van, and hotel rooms when I am out of town. On a normal day, I crank out almost 100 weather cuts for the different stations for various dayparts. The nice thing is that I always look good on the radio!