The past week's worth of severe weather coverage (along with some today in fact) has caused me to notice more and more that television meteorologists need to be very careful about making the following mistakes that can make information reception and delivery very difficult, and at times can even cost someone their life...
False Sense of Security
This can come about in a variety of different ways, and I think I saw just about all of them in the last seven days. If an OCM (to make this easier to type) sees a warning area and then begins to estimate that someone within that warning area is likely OK even though the NWS feel otherwise.
If an OCM looks at a storm and suggests that it does not look that bad (this actually happened Wednesday and moments later a tornado was confirmed on the ground with the OCM reluctantly admitting that he didn't see it on radar.)
If an OCM gives an all clear before the warning has officially expired. This is especially bothersome if the storm has not exited the warned area yet.
Ignoring Storm Reports
One thing that I have noticed that I find to be insane is the ignorance of storm reports. This past week, one OCM got a report from a local fire department of a tornado on the ground. It has been my belief that if a report like that comes in, this information is to be given to the public immediately and let them do with it what they will.
Instead, this OCM stated on the air that he would have to verify that first. He also had a nasty habit of doing similar things with every report. Pretty much if it didn't come from a trained storm spotter he refused to accept it and report it.
Talking Over One Another
When I was growing up, severe weather bulletins were handled by a single OCM. They would put the radar up behind them and tell people what was going on. If a second meteorologist was in the studio, they were simply there to field reports and keep track of things while the OCM was on the air.
Nowadays we see more and more television stations assigning anywhere from two to four meteorologists on duty during severe weather coverage, and it seems that none of them were given the designation as "captain" yet all were given live microphones.
It's hard to get your information when it's coming at you from multiple sources, each of which with their own theory.
Talking Above the Viewers' Heads
When a man goes to the doctor, he asks the doctor to spell out his condition or his diagnosis in layman's terms since it's much easier to digest that way. That is even more important during severe weather announcements, yet more and more I see OCM's using meteorology jargon on the air.
Nine out of ten people have no clue what the Fujita scale really is. They do not know what a supercell thunderstorm is. They hear multi-vortex tornado and wonder if that has something to do with the weather or if it's a new anime premiering on Cartoon Network.
The simplest and bluntest terms are all that are needed in times like these. "We have reports of a very large and potentially violent, life threatening tornado on the ground. Get to your storm house, basement, safe room, and if all else fails your bathroom or hallway. This thing can kill you if you are in its path." That's all that needs to be said for the viewers to get an image in their head of exactly what the OCM is conveying without having to have a degree.
Playing with the Tech Toys
Just a moment ago, I was watching two OCMs, and one of them was adding street data for a thunderstorm on the radar...and the street data covered up the entire map and overlapped to the point that you could not read it.
The other night, the radar was covered up by so many warnings that it got to the point that it wasn't worth even trying to find your location because it was all globs of orange, yellow, and red running together.
Those 3D shots that they have loved for the better part of fifteen years now are pointless to most people watching who sit trying to figure out what that bar graph on the screen means.
Again, less is more. Have a radar map ready, have a warning map ready, do not combine the two when on the air covering severe weather, and don't get cute with sheer markers or velocity indicators or anything like that. People can understand radar, they can understand warning maps, and in the worst of times can even understand "red/green meet = bad." The rest is simply a bunch of big weather geeks showing off their toys to the general public.
When tornadoes and severe thunderstorms are breaking out across an area, it is time to deliver information at a steady pace in repetitive fashion. Simply tell people where the storm is, where it is going, remind them of how to stay safe, keep any updates coming, and repeat this process over and over again throughout the coverage. It may not make for good television, but weather cut ins are not "good TV" they are critical information.
