Weather Channel launches ‘Weather Geeks’

There's a new way for you to get your weather fix each week -- sort of a Meet The (Weather) Press.

The Weather Channel is launching a new half-hour show on weekends called, appropriately enough, "Weather Geeks." The weather talk show will focus on current weather topics of the week.

The initial show airs Sunday, July 20, with tornado and severe storms expert Charles Doswell discussing the benefits (or insanity) of modern day storm chasing.

 Today, The Weather Channel®  is announcing “Weather Geeks” - a televised forum by and for the weather community. Whether it be mitigating against drought, chemtrails and HAARP; debating machines vs. humans in weather forecasting; or discussing the pros and cons of storm chasing -- Weather Geeks will seek to tackle the issues that are top of mind in the weather community but rarely explored in depth on television. 

Weather Geeks will premiere on Sunday, July 20, at noon ET on The Weather Channel network and will air weekly in that time slot. The show will be hosted by Dr. Marshall Shepherd, past president of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) and director of the University of Georgia's atmospheric sciences program.

Guests on Weather Geeks will come from all areas of meteorology -- from NOAA and NWS officials to academics and members of the media or private sector. The first episode of Weather Geeks will focus on the merits of storm chasing and ask the tough questions - is it worth it? what is the value? are chasers putting themselves and others at risk? The episode will feature expert host Dr. Marshall Shepherd and his guest, world-renowned storm chaser Dr. Charles Doswell.

Doswell is an interesting choice as a first guest. He has been outspoken about the insanity of modern day storm chasing, which in my opinion has become a sort of amateur hour cottage industry.

Here's a somewhat provocative clip from Doswell's blog in June.

According to Wikipedia, the "Me Generation" is the so-called Baby Boomers - my generation.  Of late, it seems to me that our current 20-somethings are strong competitors for that label.  As a weather geek, I'm probably not the most knowledgeable about such things, but it sure seems to me that storm chasing is being flooded with a large infusion of folks out there chasing who are, as my friend Gene Moore says, mostly about themselves and not so much about the storms.  "Look at me!" they shout.  "I'm special because I chase storms [stupidly!]."  They seem to care little or nothing about the feelings of storm victims as they cheer a tornado touchdown in their videos.  They thumb their noses at the very notion of chasers being responsible to others.

Doswell also takes a shot at private sector meteorologists who promote themselves. I think Charles is on to something important here. There are some private sector "corporate" meteorologists who use web and on air content presented as objective news reports, as an opportunity to promote their for profit meteorology businesses. Doswell clearly sees that trend as a clear ethical violation.

Here are a couple of clips from his post.

Private sector forecasters have a proclivity for this, especially when they actually appear on the air, promoting themselves rather than focusing on their statutory obligation to disseminate weather information.  

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No, the private sector is blatantly self-promotional, and is evidently willing to use every situation to promote themselves and disparage their "competition".  They are the quintessential proponents of themselves.  Rarely do they subject their own products to rigorous verification, and even more infrequently do they publish their verification statistics for all to see.  "I'm great! Take my word for it!" they proclaim.  A few are exceptions to this typical behavior - more power to them.  But self-serving promotion of themselves is rampant and unethical, in my view.  The American Meteorological Society should be much more aggressive in pursuing ethical violations by its members, it seems to me.

Buckle up. This should be an interesting program to watch.