Wall-to-Wall Coverage. A Thing of the Past?

[Steve Holmes]

As I write this, NWS San Angelo reports "a confirmed large and extremely dangerous tornado" in Coke County, Texas, part of the San Angelo-Abilene TV market. Yet I have not found a station doing live coverage, either on-air or on Facebook. Just graphics of tornado warnings.

In the past year, I've seen this often enough, and in enough markets, to believe it's a trend: Stations either doing no coverage, or just having occasional cut-ins with tornado warnings active in their markets.

What gives?

 

[Warren Faidley]

I'm assuming that area is not use to doing live coverage and likely not that often?

 

[Boris Konon]

As I write this, NWS San Angelo reports "a confirmed large and extremely dangerous tornado" in Coke County, Texas, part of the San Angelo-Abilene TV market. Yet I have not found a station doing live coverage, either on-air or on Facebook. Just graphics of tornado warnings.

In the past year, I've seen this often enough, and in enough markets, to believe it's a trend: Stations either doing no coverage, or just having occasional cut-ins with tornado warnings active in their markets.

What gives?

I thought it was an FCC rule for public safety that a tornado warming required local TV stations to do continuous coverage as long as tornado warming was in effect in their DMA. However, it may be a regional, like where tornado warnings are less common.

 

[John Farley]

FWIW, there was wall-to-wall coverage in OKC for many hours on the 27th (I saw over 4 hours between TV in a restaurant and in my room, and saw neither the start nor the end of it). So it is not a thing of the past everywhere. In some areas, though, it is done more when larger population centers are at risk.

 

[Matt Zumbrunn]

Wall to Wall on WIBW 13 out of Topeka when it threatens their viewing area as well.

 

[Mike Smith]

It is wall-to-wall in Wichita.

However, there is no FCC rule that TV stations have to do wall-to-wall or even that they have to cover tornadoes at all. The FCC requirement is that radio and TV stations must be operated "in the public interest." In the history of broadcastingly, only one station (WRKO in NYC) has ever lost its license for that reason.

It is possible the ABI-SJT market doesn't even have sufficient staffing to do wall-to-wall in this era of reduced TV staffing. The Weather Channel laid off a bunch of people earlier this week, including Mike Slidel.

 

[Steve Holmes]

In OKC, weather is big business. I expect wall-to-wall there. Wichita, too.

Elsewhere, it could be a staffing issue, as @Mike Smith suggested. It could be, too, that the people who complained to the mets about their TV golf being interrupted took their complaints up the food chain to the station bosses, who said, "Don't interrupt TV golf!" I can't imagine this decision being made by the weather folk. I don't want to call anyone out, but last year, an Omaha station went back to regular programming with an active tornado warning in its coverage area - and not out on the fringe. There are other examples.

 

[Warren Faidley]

Internet coverage, like Ryan Hall provides is the future of broadcast meteorology. It only takes a few people to produce a show and the cost is a fraction of having a large operation and studio.

I'm really surprised more outlets have not gone to online coverage (as opposed to a simulcast of TV coverage). Obviously, local stations are required to cover major events, but they often skip smaller events or sneak attacks. I hope Ryan can execute a business 101 tactic and capture the Internet market ASAP. He's great on major events, but missed the last few days. To do this right, you (or a back-up person), needs to be able to go on the air immediately when something worthy hits. A large portion of his audience are people looking for thrills and near death, e.g., chasers getting too close, so there is a major audience all the time.

 

[Blake Naftel]

Staffing issues, as Mike noted, is indeed a causation for the lack of coverage for certain affiliates that fall within traditional local television [and radio] broadcast media, even for markets where severe weather is more prevalent and warrants W2W coverage. Some stations do excel better than others, but 100% agree with Warren that the internet steaming model such as the Ryan Hall "brand" is where broadcast meteorology is headed or in many cases, already has rooted. It's also a push away from the suit and tie and/or primary color dresses for on-air talent and leans more towards the casually dressed "at home" podcast studio look that clicks with viewers. Severe weather coverage and storm chasing is infotainment, now more so than ever before. Regardless, that coverage style requires a balanced personality, energy, quality delivery skills and a knowledgeable team behind the scenes to make it happen. Solo efforts will not cut it. Technology and staffing have become so efficient than anyone with the funds to do so can build a "home" studio, yet brand and presentation are key to that formula, already well established via RH'Y. Analytics and viewer numbers don't lie.

Station ownership groups [Nexstar, Sinclair, Scripps, Gray, etc] and most national legacy media have desperately clung to a very classic, albeit outdated style of weather presentation in terms of severe weather delivery. There is very little push or room for streaming experimentation when a format, established decades ago, still technically works. Further pushback on live streamed storm chasing was also culled by many station groups after the fatal [streamed] storm chasing events of 2017 resulted in eventual lawsuits. Live and drives, as they were frequently referred to, quickly became a big liability in an already financially unstable industry. Live storm trackers clearly are still prevalent, but the majority are not in anyway directly on station or company payrolls aside from perhaps 2%, and those who are often have other duties and obligations attached to the "job title" mix.

 

[Mike Smith]

. Live storm trackers clearly are still prevalent, but the majority are not in anyway directly on station or company payrolls aside from perhaps 2%, and those who are often have other duties and obligations attached to the "job title" mix.

Good morning, everyone,

In Wichita, each station has a meteorologist who goes out with a photographer to chase. These are full-time station employees. It is encouraging that, even in this day of reduced staffing, the ICT stations still have as many as 4.5 or even 5 full-time meteorologists. How long that will last is anyone's guess, but their audience research tells them that, in the Great Plains, weather is --- by far -- the number one reason people watch TV news.

 

[Andy Wehrle]

My station here in Madison, WI (where we get a decent amount of severe weather; but large, long-tracked E/F3+ tornadoes are an about one every 10-15 years phenomenon in our DMA) has a policy of being wall-to-wall on air any time a tornado warning is active in our viewing area. That did run into a staffing issue once in my memory, on a day when no severe weather was expected and someone at the NWS Milwaukee got trigger-happy and issued what was effectively a bogus warning while our meteorologist on duty was on his dinner break. I was watching from home (I work mornings) and we had our evening anchor voice over the "Sky Tracker" (basically a wide shot radar loop), repeating the NWS warning text verbatim, until the meteorologist got back.

 

[Jesse Risley]

Our station, consistent with Gray's corporate policies, necessitates wall-to-wall coverage whenever a tornado warning is in place within the DMA. I don't believe FCC rules require wall-to-wall coverage but broadcast entities are required to disseminate the warnings: Access to Emergency Information on Television

 

[Andy Wehrle]

Our station, consistent with Gray's corporate policies, necessitate wall-to-wall coverage whenever a tornado warning is in place within the DMA. I don't believe FCC rules require wall-to-wall coverage but broadcast entities are required to disseminate the warnings: Access to Emergency Information on Television

I work for a Gray station as well.

 

[Mike Smith]

Our station, consistent with Gray's corporate policies, necessitates wall-to-wall coverage whenever a tornado warning is in place within the DMA. I don't believe FCC rules require wall-to-wall coverage but broadcast entities are required to disseminate the warnings: Access to Emergency Information on Television

Thank you for updating me.

 

[Jesse Risley]

Station ownership groups [Nexstar, Sinclair, Scripps, Gray, etc] and most national legacy media have desperately clung to a very classic, albeit outdated style of weather presentation in terms of severe weather delivery. There is very little push or room for streaming experimentation when a format, established decades ago, still technically works. Further pushback on live streamed storm chasing was also culled by many station groups after the fatal [streamed] storm chasing events of 2017 resulted in eventual lawsuits. Live and drives, as they were frequently referred to, quickly became a big liability in an already financially unstable industry. Live storm trackers clearly are still prevalent, but the majority are not in anyway directly on station or company payrolls aside from perhaps 2%, and those who are often have other duties and obligations attached to the "job title" mix.

There are some changes emerging here. Decision makers are recognizing that the future of television as we know it does not lie in the over-the-air legacy broadcasts of the past as increasing segments of the populace have "cut the cord" and obtain news either from digital streaming platforms or other Internet-related sources that may or may not be coterminous with legacy titans (e.g., NYT, WSJ, ABC, NBC, CNN, etc.). I cannot speak for all of those corporate entities, but at least for Gray, stations (at least ours) live stream wall-to-wall coverage via their social media pages (usually FB, maybe X too) and also provide a live stream feed via the website and the news and/or weather apps. I'm pretty sure there is a push for synchronicity here market-wide but individual variances may be allowed as staffing or production needs so permit. There is also a gradual emergence of a 24-hour live weather stream concept that, depending on staffing, may or may not have one of the mets actually producing content solely for that stream throughout their shift. We recently launched something like this in a market size 178. I suppose time will tell if ad revenues push weather content in this direction long-term or not, but that's where things seem to be headed.