Panic in Detroit

A small group of people in Metro Detroit can cause panic just by being seen or having their words repeated.

I’m talking about weathercasters on local television stations. Think about it.

A week ago Friday, we endured heavy rains, just one month after an historic rainstorm shut down major freeways, consumed cars, households and even one life.  This time, thousands more homes flooded, and more than 230,000 homes were left without power. The rains started about 2 p.m. that day and continued through the evening.

I usually watch NBC’s local news. Their weathercaster not only told his audience, during his time slot, that it was raining hard, but broke into  other broadcasts following the news to tell you it was still raining, as if you didn’t know.

Fast-forward to last Tuesday, four days after that storm. The "meteorologists" were predicting another storm of the same magnitude for the following day (Wednesday). Tornadoes were predicted for the downriver area.

That was all they needed to do.

This time, on Wednesday, everyone panicked in downtown Detroit. As the skies became gray, businesses sent employees home early so they wouldn’t get stuck in freeway flooding. That caused huge pileups on outbound freeways such as I-94 and I-75 about 1 p.m. Wednesday.

That happens to be around when the rains started. This time, though, it was different.

While it rained heavily for about 45 minutes, that was it. No daylong rains. No lava flows. Just repeated warnings from the area’s storm watchers that “boy oh boy, we’re going to get it now."

Now never came. No tornadoes, either. By 6 o’clock Wednesday evening, a quick trip through the local news stations showed weathercasters sheepishly explaining that their much-touted technology had indeed predicted we would get hit by another tremendous storm, which … fizzled out.

That’s just one instance of this sort of behavior. I don’t think the forecasters realize they lose credibility every time they’re wrong. I don't know whether that is happening more frequently than before, but it sure feels like it.

 People are growing tired of making plans based on bad information. I don’t need a weathercaster to tell me we’re going to have an early, cold winter this year. Neither do you – just step outside.

Do you think that you could be wrong as often as the weathercasters, haul down a ton of dough and not get fired?

I didn't think so, either.