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WSB's Mellish Proves Perception is Reality

R

RoddyFreeman

It's great that WSB has Kirk Mellish because people believe he's the best forecaster in the market.

Friday morning, Scott Slade said to Mellish (paraphrased), "Hopefully there's some rain in the forecast." Mellish responded, "Unfortunately not, Scott, with the weather pattern we're in except for some isolated thunderstorms in the evenings."

Well, guess what. It's been raining all afternoon. When Mellish is right, however, he's not shy about reminding the audience about what he predicted.

With all the computer models at their fingertips, I would bet all weathercasters--meteorologist or not--give forecasts that are as "accurate and dependable" as WSB.

But like the old ad campaign for Rolling Stone claimed, perception is reality. That's why TV stations need someone who's really a meterologist, and why people tune to WSB for weather.
 
The National Weather Service and the new guy on WSB-TV yesterday morning didn't have it right either. NWS and Brad (I think that's his name) said scattered showers Saturday night, better chance today and lots of rain on Monday. They both underestimated the probability. The frustrating thing is that if you're going to hype a weather guy, you need to have him update the forecast when it turns out wrong.

Driving through Atlanta last night, there was a strong storm in Douglasville and the 9pm WSB-AM news didn't say it was a strong storm, just a scattered shower. And they're looking at the radar live.

Weekend weather on the radio, in a word, sucks.
 
What was his forecast for Sunday???

On Friday he said no rain in the forecast. But his prediction on Saturday morning was thunderstorms in the late afternoon and evening.

Well, it didn't rain Friday, and Saturday's storms hit IN THE EVENING!

Wow. Too bad he was right. You almost had something there.
 
Mellish's forecast on Friday went through Sunday. Unless what I saw (and felt) this afternoon was partly cloudy, he wasn't so right.

I'm not really faulting his forecasting ability because weather patterns change. I'm just saying that other forecasters in town are as right as he is. But to WSB's credit, the station's positioning and Mellish's crowing have given WSB a perception of being the place to turn for weather.
 
Kirk Mellish and Ken Cook are THE only two even close to real meteorologists in this town!!
No....not even close to perfect......but statistically more accurate than others.
Now there's statistics and damned statistics....I know....it's hard to prove. But after years of listening to ALL the forecasters it is clear, at least to me, that Ken Cook, Kirk Mellish, and Johnny Beckman are the only forecasters even close to professional that this market has ever seen.And Johnny retired years ago.....
Glenn Burns is a nice guy, and has a terrific presentation, but tends to sensationalize the weather.....for ratings, I'm sure! I just can't believe anyone would tune to Channel 2 in a REAL weather emergency....(John Pruitt is THE only redeeming factor for Ch 2!!)
What other RADIO station even has weather besides WGST??
 
taylorengineer said:
What other RADIO station even has weather besides WGST??
Click to expand...

Ummm, J93? But then they v/t James Spann from outside the state for pre-recorded generic forecasts. Never understood what the big deal was about that.
 
Don't be so harsh on these forecasters. Where I live, 60 miles from WSB's studios, there wasn't a drop of rain all weekend long. Prediciting summer weather, particularly where rain will fall is a crap shoot at best.
 
I love the fact that these guys are criticized because they are SOMETIMES wrong when predicting the future.

I suppose if they were ALWAYS right, they'd be stockbrokers. And gazillionaires.
 
Re: WSB's Shoddy Severe Weather Coverage

RoddyFreeman said:
But like the old ad campaign for Rolling Stone claimed, perception is reality. That's why TV stations need someone who's really a meterologist, and why people tune to WSB for weather.
Click to expand...

Not me..especially when Sean Hannity's voice is coming out of the radio as a possible tornado is coming our way.

Last few times I trusted WSB for weather alerts..they were airing normal programming. Last time, It was 4 AM. I fled to the basement because we were under a tornado warning. I turned on WSB, only to hear a commercial. Kirk came on to mention the warning...then one minute later, they went on to cover the arrest of a murderer.

As a result, I went out and bought a radio that gets VHF TV stations (which will do no good come 2009).

WSB has been dropping the ball lately. If there is a tornado warning, they need to interrupt programming and stay on breaking news mode until the threat has passed. They will lose ad revenue, but you will gain listeners and trust in the end. If there is no one to talk on air, put WSB-TV audio on the air (they have done so in the past).

I wish not covering or mentioning severe weather was a license-revokable offense (AM or FM).
 
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