why do I do this....

E-mails like this are why I do this for a living and enjoy it...


Subject: Alpharetta Hail Storm
Your coverage has been phenomenal & we took our family into the basement just as the storm approached our home. We will be new viewers based on this outstanding coverage.

Attached please find pictures of the hail in our yard – taken about 10 minutes after they fell. Feel free to use them on air or on your website.

Best Regards


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On the flip side though, we get lots of negative ones. I thought you would enjoy a few of the better e-mails I got from our viewers from the storms Friday night and Saturday. I have not edited them so I apologize in advance for some of the language....


Subject: weather
Thanks for screwing up the basketball game I"ll never watch your lousy station
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Sent: Sat 3/15/2008 3:05 PM
Subject: Please tell the weather man to shut up

Please take the weather man off the air. I want to watch the game I do not care about the weather tech. so just let me know when the tornado warning is for my county but otherwise I do not care.

Thank you,

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Sent: Sat 3/15/2008 2:57 PM
Subject: SHUT UP
Please shut up about the weather! The basketball tournament is on, and you constantly break in, cover up the game, and talk over what's going on....we don't need this much information! Please SHUT UP!!!!

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Sent: Sat 3/15/2008 1:50 PM
Subject: STOP THE INSANITY
We could be watching a good basketball game but your crack weather
team keep repeating a bunch of technical info that nobody understands.
what do we the public care abot;
Are we safe, is there a tornado, when is it coming...
repeat it and then get the hell off and let us watch the basketball
game.
thi guys LOVES to repeat himself and just babble. TOO MUCH INFO
put up a crawl and get the 'weather guy' off...

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Sent: Fri 3/14/2008 9:59 PM
Subject: unfair
I think it is VERY UNFAIR that you interrupt a program for weather. Do
the bulletins at the top of the screen but don't talk for over 15
minutes. I will hear at least 300 more times later in the evening from
you. I turned to your channel because it was NOT the news. I probably
won't watch your station any more. I hope your happy. I don't care
about the dome.; I know I will hear in ultra detail for several days.
Please put the original program back on.

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Sent: Sat 3/15/2008 3:47 PM
Subject: Enough with the weather alert BS

I've been attempting to watch the Big Ten Tournament games this afternoon, and, unfortunately, have had to mute the channel and squint to watch the game, since your assbag weather man has been going over the same weather alert bullshit for the past 2-3 hours. We know, there could be bad weather ahead, move on, and get over yourselves.

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Sent: Saturday, March 15, 2008 3:13 PM
Subject:

Could we please watch the game now! You don't have repeat yourself over and over again. Just give a short summary and get off.

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Sent: Saturday, March 15, 2008 3:13 PM
Subject: Please stop!
Dear Mr. Smith,

I understand that today is a very busy day in meteorology but I would really appreciate if you could just let the Bog Ten Tournamnent play itself out without having so many interruptions about the potential for "tornadoes" in Atlanta. Thanks.

Love,

Badger Supporter

PS, I'd really like yo know what happened to Trevon Hughes versus whatever stupid thing you are saying about the weather south of atlanta. Thanks

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Sent: Saturday, March 15, 2008 2:42 PM
Subject: YOU DON'T SHUT UP!
Why do you insist on hearing yourself talk! I hate you for taking like 15 minutes talking about rotation and circling the smae place 30 times during my Michigan State Spartans game and talking about tornadoes that don't stop at stop signs! *GASP* Really, I didin't know that!

GO DIE AND LEAVE THE REST OF US ALONE!

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I know. Pretty funny stuff. Here is the reply I sent to most of them. I of course try and kill them with kindness. I did manage to get a dig in at the Big Ten.

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Dear ?????,

Thanks for taking the time to contact us here in the weather center. We always appreciate hearing from such dedicated viewers as you.

As a fan of ACC basketball (by the way, when is the Big Ten going to be competitive in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge? :-)) I understand your frustration with the weather coverage on Saturday.

I assure you that I do not enjoy listening to myself talk. As a matter a fact, I typically dread covering existing programming, but when people's lives and property are in danger in the metro area that has to take precedence. All you have to do is look at the pictures and video of the damage from Friday night and Saturday to know how dangerous the situation was for many people around the metro area.

We adjusted our coverage to take into consideration the basketball games. That is why we squeezed back rather than completely covered the games. So although you did not have the audio, you were able to see more than 90% of the games. You might have noticed that we were the only network that took into consideration our other programming. We wanted to make sure that people were able to enjoy the basketball yet those that were interested in the weather and whose lives and property were in danger could get that information as well.

While bugs and crawls are nice, they do not convey specific information about the storm and neighborhoods where it is headed. Also, when you want severe weather information you do not want to have to wait until the next cut-in... you need that information now.

Certainly we will take your opinion and ideas into consideration as we are always evaluating our severe weather coverage policy.


Thanks for watching!



Sincerely,



Chris