Meteorologists Hype The Weather. It’s What They Do Best.
There was a time when I was fluent in Celsius. Today I have to turn to Google to translate.
But back in the summer of either 1982 or 1983 I remember a headline in The Irish Press that was something like this:
“Dublin Sizzles In 22-Degree Heat.”
I was living in Ireland's capital city at the time and when the mercury climbed to 22 - that’s 72 Fahrenheit - I was finally able to venture outside without a jacket for the first time in two years.
I thought the front page was so funny that I mailed it home to my parents who were cooking in temps near 100.
My Irish friends and neighbors were truly perishing in the heat. Everywhere you looked, the natives were red-faced and panting. Dublin buses, which were already a fetid mess what with smoking allowed on the second deck, became unbearable with sweat added into the mix.
At the time I lived in an old house south of the city center with three apartments. One afternoon during Dublin’s "historic heat wave" I spied one of my neighbors sitting in our front garden - in full view of the busy street - in just her panties and bra. She was fanning herself and listening to music.
She invited me to strip down and join her in cooling off and “working on a tan.” She said she didn’t own a bathing suit.
I declined.
I was reminded of what passes for a heat wave in Europe when I saw the following story this weekend in London’s Daily Mirror:
The horror! The United Kingdom could suffer for two whole days in 78-degree weather.
We call that spring in Virginia.
Replies to this Tweet (yes, I still call them Tweets) from around the world were hilarious. From Australia to India to the U.S., insults were hurled at pantywaist Brits who can’t cope with mild temperature increases.
My fave?
To be fair, this report is really just another case of the news media catastrophizing the weather.
It happens all the time in the U.S. Especially during hurricane season when somber weather reporters tell us we’re living in the cone of doom and should evacuate. Even ordinary rainstorms are suddenly “rain events.” Snowstorms are now "bomb cyclones." Every storm is “severe.” Every cold snap is life-threatening.
Don't believe me? Get a load of this alarming weather map that apparently was featured last week on Channel 10 in Boston.
That’s right, scorching red for what are by all measures, mild temperatures.
Today’s New York Times warns of the first heat wave of the summer and treats its readers like toddlers with this story: How to Stay Cool and Safe in a Heat Wave.
Seriously? “Wipe your forehead with a cool cloth” is news?
The most famous case of weather hype - outside of The Daily Mirror, of course - was in September of 2018 when a Weather Channel reporter, Mike Seidel, was accused of exaggerating the winds as Hurricane Florence made landfall in North Carolina.
He was shown on TV bracing himself against strong winds, barely able to stand up, while two pedestrians walked directly behind him without any apparent difficulty.
Execs at the cable channel defended their reporter, claiming he was on wet grass while the passersby were on pavement.
Why do news organizations and meteorologists relentlessly magnify and misrepresent ordinary variations in the weather? Why must every storm be life-threatening? Every sharp increase or decrease in temperature require stories about “how to keep your family safe?”
Fear sells, of course. And so does climate change.
Taken together you get a bomb cyclone of misinformation. As we head into thunderstorm and hurricane season, you’ve been warned.
