Last weekend, Steve Lackmeyer dedicated five posts at OKCcentral to the standard local winter weather over-hype machine, and in particular, how it impacts the Downtown and Bricktown economy. In one of the posts, Steve even went so far as to criticize Mike Morgan. The post resulted in Mike Morgan sending the following email to Steve, and demanding that Steve post it on his "twitter site." Since Twitter posts are limited to 140 characters, Steve did the next best thing and posted it to his blog. Check it out:
Hello there Steve,
I don't know you, but I feel compelled to draw to your attention to your unfair focus of attacks on me.
I will draw to your attention, three prime examples of why my forecasts, at granted a later period in the OKC Forecast time line, we far better than others being presented at the exact same, or even later time.
1) Mark Shannon's live radio forecast at 5:45PM Friday. My Quote " I am now swinging the other way....less snow in OKC than the NWS forecast."
2) I was appalled to listen to Gary England during the OU Basketball game of his live broadcast of Quote " 4-7 inches of Snow with shutdown roads in OKC" This was between 7 and 8PM Friday Night.....after I had already stated on Channel 4's 430-5-6 and 630PM newscasts of Quote " Less snow in OKC than earlier expected, 2-4 inches, Slick spots.
and
3) Saturday Morning's live weather casts
Channel 9, Quote "OKC travel conditions today not very good at all"
My quote, repeatedly " OKC roads are fine, ONLY WET." Even went to the extent of showing a viewer email from a shopping mall merchant stating "roads are fine, please come out and shop" and THAT I AGREED WITH HER!!
You are affiliated loosely with TV9 since your email address is from the Oklahoman, your heavily slanted rant is not surprising.....been there, done that....I ask you now, show some balls and lift this email and prominently post it on your twitter site!
OK?
I am a great husband, very happily married to a nurse from Bristow and father of two, raising 5th generation Oklahoma kids.
You may, or a few others may think I have some hidden deviant agenda, I can tell you I do not. I always just try my best. At least I do it face to face with my viewers, and not behind the auspices of a computer keyboard.
With all that being said, I get it when it comes to cyberspace opinions, folks say things they would never say in person, but I also am keen to people in the media with agenda's, and I see one forming with you. I am just here to point out a few "other" angles you needed to open your eyes to.
At least I began to change my forecast as I saw it change, can we say the same about you?
Sincerely,
Mike Morgan
Weather forecaster in Oklahoma since the age of 10, that was 1974.
cc Mark Shannon
Wow...where do we begin? Our thoughts are after the jump.
Thoughts about Mike Morgan:
First of all, the fact that Mike sent this email isn't a surprise. Check out this comment he allegedly left on our site last summer in response to some readers' questioning his meteorology credentials:
Hello everyone on The Lost Ogle! Thought I might help you out a bit. I passed every METR class required for a BS at OU and even took some graduate work. Most of the instructors at OU were/are the absolute leaders in SVR WX theory. My coarsework at OU is heavily overweighted with METR, GEOG, and GEOL....So, I would say my BS degree education is more than sufficient for Oklahoma Weather and is probably more applicable now, in 2008 than it was in the 1980's. Took and passed the American Meteorology Society requirements and was obligated to **send my OU transcript** in for review and approval by the board. No one is perfect, but I have no problem with my track record over the past 28 years in TV here in my home State of Oklahoma. Hope this helps everyone out
Honestly, when I first read that comment I doubted it was Mike Morgan. Well...now you can consider me convinced.
Anyway, the best part of his letter to Lackmeyer is not when he calls out Gary England, but when he writes: "I ask you now, show some balls and lift this email and prominently post it on your twitter site!"
I'm going to go out on a limb right now and say that Mike Morgan probably became the first person to ever publicly demand that Steve Lackmeyer "show some balls." That's courage. And if he's doing that, imagine what he's saying privately to Grant Johnston and David Payne in KFOR weather center. Hell, no wonder Jonathan Condor always looks overly nervous when reading the seven day forecast.
Thoughts about Steve Lackmeyer:
Does anyone else find it odd that Steve Lackmeyer is trying to move into Lost Ogle turf? Don't we own the monopoly on local weatherman fascination? Steve's even gone so far as to encourage the other TV weatherman to write him letters. What's next, an investigative report into the accuracy of Dean Blevin's percentages?
Seriously, I'm not sure that I like this. As we've pointed out, when Steve becomes obsessed with something, he becomes dangerously obsessed. He's already dangerously obsessed with Downtown Oklahoma City. He's also dangerously obsessed with whether or not he should use Twitter. He should leave the weatherman obsessions to us, and instead become obsessed with something fun and magical like elves, unicorns or whatever floats through Rand Elliott's mind.
(Actually, I think he's already obsessed with two of those things, which two is for you to decide).
Thoughts about Winter Weather Coverage:
I don't think you can blame Mike Morgan for getting upset that he was singled out for over-sensationalizing winter weather. In Oklahoma City, winter weather hype is on the same level as living, dying, and overpaying for food at Sonic. It's going to happen and everybody does it. Blaming one ageless weatherman for it seems a bit unfair.
That being said, I think you can blame Mike for sending a confusing and unfocused email to an influential newspaper reporter that attacks the reporter's credibility. That was just stupid. All if did was bring focus to a minor situation that would have quickly died away. In a semi-ironic twist, it's very similar to what The Oklahoman did to Channel 25 a few weeks ago, only without the dunce hat, full page ad or Nick Winkler giving his friends high fives.
