Meteorologists are assholes

How would you feel about going to work, only being accurate in what you do a portion of the time and feel that you have job security? You’d feel pretty good about that scenario, right? So would I! Unfortunately, the majority of society does not have that luxury. Think about it this way, in baseball, if a player averages three for ten in his at bats across the length of a season, he is a .300 hitter. This is considered to be very good in baseball, but if you think about it, that is a 70% failure rate. Other than professional sports, where can you find a profession that allows you to be off the mark that many times and still be “good” at what you do? The answer is meteorology!

As you all know and most likely make jokes about, we get snow storms here in Buffalo. You live in the northeastern portion of the United States, and yes, snow happens. Sure, Buffalo has been hit with some storms where there was a massive amount of snow, which is where the reputation had been born. But the winters here are actually not as bad as the media makes them out to be. It is not tundra that is covered by 4 feet of snow six months a year. 

Speaking of snow, starting Friday of last week, the local meteorologists on the news were hyping a snow storm that was supposed to drop measurable amounts of snow this past Monday. They were predicting a storm that could potentially be reminiscent of an unusually early, devastating snow storm that had occurred in October of 2006. That particular surprise storm had left over 2 feet of snow, downed trees and power lines which left many people without power for quite some time. So, if this type of storm was to happen again, it would be noteworthy event. 

On Friday evening as I was watching the news, they were hyping this potential storm, but I began to question something… How the fuck is it supposed to snow with a predicted high of 40 and a low of 36 when the freezing point is 32 degrees? After seeing this forecast, I posted the following tweets: “Monday forecast: high of 40 low of 36 with potential for 8 inches of snow... Ahh yeah, isn't 32 freezing point?” and “The weatherman did cover his ass by saying "it's a changeable situation" for when it does not snow... They love getting people into a panic.” 

Now, if you live in Buffalo, you'd know why I chose the word "panic" in my tweet. When the meteorologists predict weather like this, people rush to grocery stores and gas stations in a frenzy to stockpile supplies as if they are suburban survivalists, "roughing it" in their homes for a few days. It is actually quite comical to see these idiots in the grocery stores on days like this.

As you can see in my aforementioned tweets, I immediately questioned the accuracy in their prediction days before the storm was supposed to arrive. I was hoping that the meteorologists would get their shit together, realize this very same logic of mine and change the forecast. But, they did not. They continued to hype this storm all the way through Monday morning; even the national media became involved with the Weather Channel sending a correspondent here to cover the storm. 

If you follow me on twitter and were paying attention to my tweets on Monday, you’d know that storm never materialized unless you lived in the higher terrains in the southern tier of Western New York. There was nothing but rain where I live and in Downtown Buffalo where I work. Early afternoon I saw a posting that stated The Winter Storm Warning has been cancelled for northern Erie, Niagara and Genesee counties. Let me tell you, I was completely shocked... I hope you can sense the sarcasm there.

The weather channel’s correspondent who was in a location in higher elevation and saw minimal snow fall and must have been searching for some filler on his assignment because he ended up interviewing Santa Claus and let some random man play the saxophone on the air (Here is the link to video of it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wACBphO6H7E). The national coverage ended up being an epic fail which is actually humorous to me, because these idiots bought into the hype and expected a blizzard. 

My prediction of rain ended up being more accurate than the meteorologists forecast that was predicated on their high tech radar equipment. Why is that? I used common sense instead of looking at some models that a computer generates. How can these weather forecasters be so inaccurate at times? Is it that they want to prepare you for a worst case scenario? I say no. It that was the case, they would lay it out the forecast that way. I truly believe that the only time that they truly accurate is when they look at their radar and there is nothing fucking on it but clear, sunny skies. It seems that the local meteorologists are at their most inaccurate when predicting potentially large storms. Now it makes sense, I can sum it up in one word… Sensationalism! Sensationalism by definition is (esp. in journalism) the use of exciting or shocking stories or language at the expense of accuracy, in order to provoke public interest or excitement. 

I am not making this an issue over this one particular incident; it is just the most recent event of a general atmosphere of inaccuracy in this field of study. The broadcast media has no fucking soul at times. These fuckers have no shame in creating a story out of nothing just to drum up ratings for the six and eleven o’clock news. Personally, I’d feel like an idiot showing my face on air again after such failures, but these people show up day after day with excuses in hand.  Why wouldn’t they though, they have a built in excuse of the weather being unpredictable because there is always the potential for unexpected changes in blah blah blah.

I’m not sure about the rest of you, but I treat weather forecasts with an “I’ll believe it when I see it” mentality. It is almost as if it has become “The boy who cried wolf” complex for me. Sometimes they are right, sometimes they are wrong… what can we do but deal with it. It’s not like we could do much better. I just want them to be more realistic with the predictions instead of occasionally riding the hype machine and driving people into weather crazed frenzies. There’s enough shite wrong in this world… we do not need this crap on top of it!