Storming the Worlds of Weather & Sports with Ian Oliver

Join Kyle David as he sits down with lan Oliver, meteorologist at Fox Weather and host of the "Storming the Field" podcast, for a lively discussion about weather, sports, and the exciting intersection of the two! This episode dives into lan's journey from a young weather enthusiast to a national weather expert, sharing his experience with hurricane hunters, covering devastating weather events, and launching his popular sports-weather podcast. Ian also offers valuable advice for aspiring meteorologists and discusses his thoughts on the future of digital weather media.

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About the Everything Weather Podcast

A weekly podcast where we talk with people about the weather world, explore and discuss everything weather and the many things that connect to it, and have a little fun along the way. The podcast is hosted and produced by Kyle David, a meteorologist and digital science content producer based in New Jersey.

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Transcript

0:06

Hello and welcome to the Everything Weather podcast. I'm your host Kyle David and here we talk to people about the weather world, explore and discuss everything weather, and have a little fun along the way. Today on the podcast, I'm very excited to have Ian Oliver with me. Ian is a meteorologist with the ever growing weather media group, Fox Weather. He is also the host of Fox Weather Now and Fox Weather's newest weather sports podcast, Storming the Field Alongside Steve Bender. Hey there, Ian, and welcome to the podcast. Hey, Kyle. It's great to be a part of this. You're doing an awesome job with it. Thank you, I greatly appreciate that. I hope we have some fun on the podcast, exploring the weather and doing some games as well. Sounds good to me. And speaking of games, I have the first fun game for you. Would You Rather. We're gonna do a couple of Would You Rather questions, some are weather themed, I got a couple of sports weather themed ones, because you do sports and weather. So, with that said Would you rather experience a Category 5 hurricane or an EF5 tornado? Ugh, honestly, it's two horrible things, right? I would go Cat 5 hurricane because Cat5 hurricanes, they don't sneak up on anybody. Like the short fused nature of severe weather, to me, the power of Mother Nature is awesome and terrifying. Both of those things should terrify people. I'll take the Cat5 though, just because I can put myself in a position to be a little bit more prepared for it, as opposed to the EF5. The category 5 hurricane? Yeah. That's some good rationale there. Now, would you rather play a football game in freezing temperatures or a baseball game in 100 degree heat? Oh, I'm playing baseball all day. Dog days of summer. The boys of summer baseball. The heat is fine. I don't want to play a football game in any temperature because it means I'm getting hit by super athletic 300 pound dudes. At least if I'm sweating it out in baseball and nobody's hitting me. So, I'll go with that. So, just curious. This is like an impromptu would you rather question. So, would you rather get hit by a fastball? Or get tackled by one of the best linebackers in the NFL. The fastball all day. It's not going to feel good, but at least I'll be alive still. As opposed to like an Aaron Donald or the TJ Watt or something like that. That'd be the last hit I ever took, I think. Or if you're on the other end, Derrick Henry running at you. Yeah, no thanks. No, you gotta make a lot of business decisions get made even in the NFL and I'm not carrying quite 200 pounds. So I think it would be the last hit I took. I think I'll join you with that. I don't want a Derrick Henry built player running out. No, I don't need to be on the not top 10. On my back, as Derrick Henry's trotting in. Or on one of the like, boom clip compilations on YouTube. Yeah, that you got truck sticked. Exactly, yeah. Alright, would you rather live in a place with constant rain or constant snow for an entire year? Constant snow, no questions. Snow you can ski on, and there's joy, that joy that comes from snow. I talk with my wife about this all the time. My rules for a place to live. Mountains, water, preferably both. So snow, I would, in my mind, imagine that it's coming with mountains, and at least checks off one of my boxes. Okay. Would you rather have to deal with high winds during a golf tournament, or heavy rain during a tennis match? Am I playing in said events, or am I watching? Uh, we'll say you're playing in the event. Uh, definitely wind and golf. Cause then at least I have an excuse. It messes me up. I played in a golf tournament with my buddy. I play in it every year and the wind was blowing all three days. This was back in July. And to be fair to myself, my. My drive has a slice and it just gets knocked down by the wind and it was miserable So I I know the feeling of being embarrassed by wind in golf and I've been hurt before so I can be hurt again I suck at golf. So I would definitely use the excuse of high wind. You're a little more experienced We all suck at golf to some extent to be honest A little bit. Yeah certain degree To a certain degree. No weather pun intended there. Would you rather endure a week long heat wave with no air condition, or a week long blizzard with no heating? Mmm. I mean, heat is dangerous, man. That's more than a comfort thing. But so is a blizzard and cold. You can't get out. Am I aware of these things that are coming in advance? I have access to a Fox Weather forecast, or am I being surprised? I like your planning with this. We'll say You have a day's notice before they come for you. If I have a day's notice and I can get to the market, I'm going to go blizzard, stock up on food, warm clothes, and, and be chilling literally, as opposed to, uh, you can only take off so many layers, right? When you get into a heat wave, no AC, especially in this place. Living in New York, heat and no AC is miserable, so yeah, I'm gonna go with the cold. Yeah, you also have the urban heat island effect that makes things worse. Yeah, you get some smells going on, you get all kinds of funky stuff happening, heat makes people crazy. Yeah, I'm going with the blizzard all day. Well, to rebuttal on that, snow makes people crazy too on the roads. True, true, but if it's a week long blizzard, people are being crazy in their own houses. Stuck. I'm not dealing with them. The heat people are out and about, bringing their crazy to the open world. Alright, that's fair. Got one more for you. Would you rather run a marathon during a thunderstorm or dense fog? Tense fog all day. I'm not much of a runner. Uh, Dylan, he's training for half marathons. We've been talking about running a lot lately is a weather producer on a Fox weather. Now, at least if I'm running in fog, I don't have to see where I'm going. And I maybe don't know how much more running I have to do because I'm not enjoying it. But as a guy that lived down in Florida, I'm not trying to do anything in a thunderstorm. I'm embarrassed to admit how many thunderstorms on, like, the golf course I've been stuck in, and it is not a good time. Uh, I don't want to be running in rain. I definitely don't want to be running if there's a lightning hazard in the mix. And I honestly don't want to be running at all. I hate, I hate running, so at least the fog, the fog will save me from myself a little bit. Fair point. I think I'd probably go with the thunderstorm just so I'd see where I'm going. Yeah, it'll keep you cooler at least. Unless you get the lightning. The lightning is It's a low chance, but it's a big, it's a big hazard, man. And it's around almost every day in the rainy season down south. So you got a more decision making with that and a lot of radar tracking. Absolutely. Yeah. All right. That is our last would you rather question. And let's get into talking a little bit about you. So everybody I have on the podcast, I ask them their weather story. We in the communications weather business refer to that as the day's weather. But in this podcast, I talk about it with your story. So tell me, Ian, what is your weather story? What got you interested in everything weather? It's a nice thing for you to have on your podcast. Well, one of the coolest things about weather. is that literally everyone that works in this business has a weather story. And even folks that are just weather enthusiasts have weather stories. There's some strange connection between nature and people. It just leaves such a mark, and people have such vivid memories. For me, it was Hurricane Bob, 1991. I was a little kid. And it hit Massachusetts, and I was standing by our sliding door. And trees were snapping in our backyard. And my mom said, my sister and I were just looking out the window and we weren't scared, we were just wowed. And she was like, that's odd because I think now I get it as a grown up and a homeowner and stuff. I lived through it, living down in Florida for so many years. These are terrifying situations when you're worried about the safety of your family, whether your property is going to hold up. But as little kids, we were just like, wow, this, this is amazing. This is super cool. That I think probably left a bit of a mark. And then growing up where I did, I'd watch hurricanes, but I'd watch Nor'easters more so than anything to see if we were going to have a snow day. We were a ski family. So I was always rooting for a ski country to get snow. So that was a reason to keep tabs on, I grew up in South coast of Massachusetts. There's around the fringe between the Providence and Boston markets. And I would watch. local weather all the time just to see what they were thinking at that point there wasn't access to forecast models like there is now and I got into high school I saw where did people in these markets go in Boston and Providence and a bunch of them to keep it on the snow theme were all Uh, Linden State Mets, and I played, I played soccer year round as a kid through, through high school, and then I ended up playing soccer at Linden State, and I loved to ski, and I had an opportunity to do both of those things there, and learn about weather and broadcasting, so it seemed like a perfect fit, and I loved living up in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, and then I ended up, I was lucky to get my first gig over in the Champlain Valley. I just went a little bit west across the Green Mountains to Burlington, Vermont, Vermont. And that's where, uh, I got my TV career started. So I, I was super, super lucky to find a place that for me, checked all my boxes, a place where I would be super at home and comfortable and happy. And then I get to stay in a wonderful place to start my career. I mean, not everybody has that opportunity. Sometimes you're going to oftentimes just that and the other place as you get your TV career started and you go. some random market USA and you're there for a few years and you're learning the ropes. And I was able to do that right home in New England. And you had mentioned earlier that you grew up watching some of the Mets in your local area. Who were some of your role models for you? So in Boston, the nice thing about this business is TV industry is tough and there are so many challenges, but There are also so many good people that look out for younger folks and people that are up and coming and trying to get going in this business. And I remember Sharon Meyer and Dan Dowling. Dan Dowling was my performance teacher at Linden State and he was a wonderful influence on me, not just educationally, but learning what a pro in this industry looks like. And him and Sharon took me in and really helped me get started. My news director, Anson Tebbets at the time, up in Vermont. wonderful people to help keep, keep me, keep me growing in early part of my career. But before that, when I was still at Linden State, I emailed Pete Bouchard, who he's still at NBC Boston. He was at WHGH at the time. And I emailed him. I said, Hey, Pete, I'm Ian. I go to Linden State. He was a Linden State grad. I'm like, can I just come in and meet you? I'd love to see the place and have a weather chat. Not all on like, like this. It's pretty easy to talk about weather. And I was like, yeah, cool. I went in there. It's in government center in Boston. I hung out, he let me make a couple of graphics for him on the old weather central, which was super cool to see a graphic I made. It used to let the render them out at that point. And then that made it on the air in Boston. And I was blown away by how cool that was. And then I said, Hey, like. Do you have a summer intern? I'd love to hang out. And he was like, yeah, I'm looking at him. And that was how I got my internship at NBC Boston. So it was, it's just relationships like that. And Pete, out of the kindness of his heart, let me hang around for the summer. And that was a wonderful glimpse. I mean, you can spend forever in the classroom and broadcast performance and trying to learn, but until you see. what the job actually looks like. You don't really know if it's going to be for you. So I loved it. I loved like the energy of the newsroom and getting ready to roll and the fact that the show starts at 6P. 6P is 6P and you have to be ready by then. It's so objective based and timeline based. And then he and I would be in front of the green wall. I was so bad early on in my career. And, and he would go, I can't even look, I have some clips. I like can't even watch them. And I know that's the case for a lot of people early on in their careers. And that is like my unsolicited advice for people that are just starting as on air Mets, it's like, just be bad, like be you authentically. And be bad, and get reps, and you will get better, but as long as you're being authentically yourself, that can't be taught. Like, don't try to do your best impression of what you think a TV meteorologist is, just be you doing meteorology on TV. And with time and reps, you're gonna get better, and you're gonna get more polished, and as that process happens, you'll still be you. It's just a better broadcasting version of it, and that's where the value is in my opinion. So, all those little things started getting me going on a path where I could, like I said, we would, we had a little TV station, and I had a really thick Massachusetts accent. Not Boston, Fall River, which is, there's a slight difference down into it, and people would write in, we would have like little ratings periods or sweeps, it's like, this kid doesn't belong on TV, he should be on the shipyard in Boston, this and that, and it was. It's not easy, it's a tough business, but I needed to hear it. And there was a lady, Charlotte Albright was her name. She worked for NPR up in Vermont, and she helped me. She did voice coaching and helped me clean up my speech and lose, at least throttle back the accent a little bit. I think a little bit is endearing and regional and it's part of you, but if people, all they can hear is your accent and it's distracting from Where your actual forecasted message is, that's a problem. So that, I get to work on that, and that was all little tweaks early on in my career. I can't imagine you having a thick, like, New England accent. I've got some clips of that. Yeah, it was as thick as it gets. Interesting. All right. So you had mentioned the internship, and I want to actually ask you something about that. And you could even throw in some stuff you've learned from Lyndon State into this question. Can you share a moment where you learned something from your internship or Lyndon State that has shaped your practice today? I had a professor, Dr. Atkins, and he always said, The atmosphere is a fundamentally chaotic fluid. Chaos in the sense that There are unforecastable elements, there are small scale things that will never be able to be resolved by forecast models. I guess I shouldn't say ever, we're in the AI world and stuff, and we're seeing all kinds of crazy advances in the science. But that's the science y way of, I guess you could say, stay humble, right? And it doesn't matter how many forecasts you get right. There are always going to be events that humble you. So, it's like Star Wars that only a Sith deals in absolutes. Mmm. Don't. Do not deal in absolutes. This business is conveying uncertainty with certainty. This is what we know. This is what we expect to happen. This is where we have some questions. Some question marks. And effectively, both in an entertaining and informative way, communicating that. That is the business, if you're doing your job right, in my opinion. So I've never forgotten that, that motto, which is the scientific way of saying, stay humble and have respect for this planet, this atmosphere and what you're trying to do. Yeah, because the nature at the end of the day does what it wants. That's right. Yeah. It doesn't follow our rules. It follows its own rules. Absolutely. And going forward a little bit with your time in the Champlain Valley. Some other local television stations. You've been bouncing around quite a bit. What's the most challenging forecast that you've had to put together? Yeah. The joke in my career, cause I went from Burlington, Vermont to Lexington, Kentucky to Tampa, Florida. They were joking that I was going to have to go to South America next. Cause I was, I was on a Southern trajectory, but yeah, I broke the trend, came back up North, back up to the Northeast. Obviously I do Fox weather now host that show and. It's from 3 to 6 p. m. Eastern time and that's a time of the day where everything's waking up, right? We're going from a reasonably stable atmosphere to all of a sudden sometimes severe weather outbreaks. The switch is usually being flipped at some point during our show, which is an exciting time to be on the air, but it's also challenging. Being up north, it was obviously winter weather forecasting, get some severe weather experience working in Kentucky, and then many half a dozen years being down in Tampa, having a half the year, it's a tropical environment and it's all eyes on the tropics, so. That, I really like tropical forecasting. Had the opportunity, you and I talked about the flight with the Hurricane Hunters and the Dorian once. The long fused nature of tropical forecasting, it can be taxing, but I like that, here it is. This is what its structure looks like, its intensity. This is today, that's tomorrow, that's the day after, and we're gonna watch this and look for trends and look for little deviations from what was expected and and how that's gonna have implications down the line. That, to me, I like from like a trend standpoint. Severe weather, we do a lot of tracking it, but that short fused nature is, uh, is a little anxiety inducing. So, uh, for, for that reason, I'll say severe weather. Both being in Kentucky, being down in Florida with fronts coming in up the Gulf of Mexico and you get these quick spin up tornadoes that kind of crop up out of nowhere, and then being here at Fox Weather where we're tracking the weather everywhere, coast to coast. It truly, it happens fast. And it, it is like the flip, the flip of a switch. So I'd say that's probably the biggest challenge. Yeah. And going back to what you were saying, like with tropical meteorology, you can track that out and it almost becomes like a living, breathing engine that you can monitor. Totally. A hundred percent. It's like a battery health. You have all these metrics on the tropical system are measurables and, and you can watch 'em on satellite. They move fairly quickly, but not all that fast when you consider the scale of the Atlantic Basin and the storm motion that's like 10 to 15 miles per hour. So, I would say don't sneak up on anybody. And for that reason, as big and as scary and as damaging as they can be, there's almost always time to prepare outside of a few examples that we've had with rapidly intensifying storms with origins close to the coast. Those are a different animal in a scarier situation. Absolutely. And since you had mentioned that, and you had also mentioned the hurricane hunters flying in Hurricane Dorian, that was a very prominent example of a very rapidly intensifying hurricane. And you got to fly into that with the hurricane hunters. What was that experience like? That was, it's a great example of what you said, but also like the strength of the science. For the Abacos, it was so devastating. It was a storm that effectively stopped over the Bahamas. But they didn't even have hurricane alerts up in South Florida and they were staring at this monster, a major storm by thinking this was super close to the peninsula. So that to me was amazing to see. But yeah, we took off from Lakeland Linder airfield. They used to be at McDill the hurricane hunters in Tampa. They have a suite facility now at Linder airfield in Lakeland, Florida, closer to the middle of the peninsula, a little bit closer, at least. That's their aircraft operations center. And they built out this whole fleet. They have the two P 3s, the WP 3s, a Miss Piggy and Kermit. Gonzo is there, which is the G 4, the high altitude private jet that flies around. I was on Kermit. And one of the coolest things about the Hurricane Hunter To me, at least, was that there's so much restricted airspace in this country, right? The P 3 has a special transponder on it, where they know it's the hurricane hunters. We flew low altitude from Lakeland, Florida, right over NASA. So we flew over the, the shuttle landing strip, the vehicle assembly building. You could see pad 39A. You, you could see everything at low. No other aircraft would ever be able to to fly over those areas, uh, like we did. So I'm staring out the window and that, that was one of the coolest aspects to me. But yeah, we didn't fly all that far. We're in Florida. We only flew out to the Bahamas, but we were out for like seven and a half hours into a, still a cat three storm at the time it was a major, but it was losing some of its structure and that. actually made it more monstrous because you would think, oh man, like, you talk to the pilots and the flight engineers and the meteorologists and you're like, what's the worst flight you've been on? It's always either intensifying storms or decaying storms. When you fly into a major that's well formed, the wind field's more uniform, and they can position the aircraft to battle against. It's actually not as turbulent because the wind field's more uniform. Decaying storms and intensifying storms. It's the opposite. So you're getting thrown around and that was the the situation that we were in. There's two pilots, flight engineer, which is super cool. Is this do with the leather glove and he's sitting between the two pilots and his job is only to throttle up throttle down. He's managing the throttle controls because they're trying to keep the The aircraft on a constant heading at a constant altitude, but you're getting blown around by all these different forces. So the pilots are more or less maintaining azimuth of the heading and the flight engineer for altitude purposes and speed. They're just constantly working the throttle and they put me in the little jump seat in the cockpit with the seatbelt and I'm bouncing around looking through. It was. It's amazing to see, and you punch through the eyewall, and all of a sudden everything's calm. But we had a couple people from the HRD, the Hurricane Research Division, from NHC that were with us, and there's an instrument called SFMR, Stepped Frequency Microwave Radiometer, I think. It basically shoots a signal out toward a sea surface. And the bounce back is measured. It's one of the ways that they estimate wins. And they were testing an upgrade to that. And they wanted to keep punching through the eye wall repeatedly. We did that for like three hours and the experience is all well and good. And I have a strong stomach typically, but this is local news that I'm working and I had to turn a story. For the 11 o'clock news. So I'm like, great. Well, I have, I grabbed my Mac book and I like start, I buckle myself in. I'm in the back of the plane now and I'm like trying to write my story. We had launched the drops on, and we had talked to the pilots and the meteorologists and the engineers and trying to put this story together. I'm staring at my Mac book screen. And all of a sudden I was starting to lose it a little bit. So just with the excitement of the day too, I hadn't eaten either. So I always make the jokes that there's a granola bar that's whereabouts unknown. No one knows what happened to it on the hurricane, on their flight. As I very sneakily and discreetly jettisoned some of the contents of my belly and didn't tell anybody. And kept it moving. That's an experience. You got to, you, so you not only got to fly into a hurricane, but you got to work in a hurricane. Right up the story and stuff. Yeah, the flying was fun. The working was less fun. I was totally good until I needed to stare at a screen and the screen was bouncing all over the place and everything. It puts a whole nother meaning on trying to work while there's turbulence going on. Yes. Remote work. Remote work. There we go. That's a very awesome experience. I'm curious. How has that experience flying into Dorian, even like doing work while you were in Dorian, how has that changed your approach to hurricane forecasting and reporting on these big tropical systems? That was a once in a lifetime thing for me and it just gives you a different Set a context. It is one thing to report on these storms and you see what the structure looks like on satellite, sometimes on radar and all this different data. Being inside a storm, that, that's a, that's a straight up authentic experience. You really see and feel what, what these kinds of things look like. And it just gives you a new respect for the scale of those. When you punch the eye wall, and then all of a sudden you're in the eye and you get that. We had a little bit of the stadium effect, and it was just like, wow. Like, the scale becomes very apparent. And then you consider the real world implications about a storm like this crashing. into the shore somewhere. We get into these scenarios where it's not an if it's where we're going to see devastating impacts. And it just gives you a little bit more respect and an appreciation, not just of the science, but what, uh, what those men and women do. They're flying hundreds of flights every season. I had one where I'm losing my lunch, but that, that, that data is. Super important to, to improve our forecasts and, and hopefully help protect life and property as, as we put together a better forecast to, to communicate. Yeah. And you'd mentioned that you're also doing work to help the study of these things. And you're also trying to get a better understanding of these weather events to lessen that impact you were talking about. And you even talked about that nature to weather connection is something that interested you. Yeah. Can you tell me another experience where you got to See the impact the aftermath of an event from either your time in local television or with Fox weather that has really Change the way you tell this weather story. Honestly, most recently in my career, 2011, I was working in Vermont still. And we had the remnants of Irene come in and put down six, seven, eight, nine inches, and all that rain just rushed. We know tropical moisture, terrain don't mix. And we just had a horrible example of that. Probably the worst ever in Western North Carolina with what happened with Helene. And in the lead up to that, we're looking at the rain forecasts. It's events like that you call back to. It was months that we would get to work at Channel 3 in Vermont, and it would be, Ian, you're going to Waitsfield. Susie, you're going there. Molly, you're going there. And all of us would just go to different communities and tell them the same story. Many different stories, but the same theme. Of just devastation when you have water like that that just rushes into communities and just wipes things out, the power of water when gravity is pulling it down into the valleys. So it gives you like a pit in your stomach in the lead up to something like Heleno. I was down in Florida covering the kind of the Florida aspect of that storm, but that was two separate disasters playing out simultaneously, the mountain aspect and then the coastal aspect with the wind and the surge. So, yeah, you get a pit in your stomach knowing when you look at the forecast and you see those kind of numbers and you know what the topography looks like there, what that's going to correlate to in the real world. And, uh, yeah, that's a hard thing, but it's also something that helps you more effectively communicate the hazards and the story because you've seen it to an extent play out that process twice. I was up in Vermont before the Winooski, when the Winooski river flooded, that wasn't a tropical situation, but that was back to back summers. But yeah, I was there and I was in downtown Montpelier, watched the river come up and flood so many of those local businesses and people's livelihood. So yeah, just living through events like that, being down in Florida and actually experiencing hurricanes in the sense that You're at work and you're doing this and you're worried about your own family and, you know, your pups, your property, having all those like actual personal concerns and anxieties and it helps you understand what folks are going through when you go on the air, it gives you a little bit more of a sense of the responsibility that we have to in terms of our language and um, Some of the verbiage that we're using, be it too strong or too weak. When you've been through that, it's like, if I say this on the air, how people will interpret it. And the feelings that it's gonna produce in these people, um, you really have to be sure that you're warranted, or not warranted in saying what you say. So yeah, just having that context. personally and professionally. I think it's a big deal and it just comes with time. Yeah and having to report on the weather and you're also in the back of your mind worrying about your family, your friends, your pups as you said. Right. That's a lot, that's a lot of stress in the moment. Yeah, yeah, it is. We all signed up for this at the gig. We're sleeping at the TV station and I remember Irma. I was down in Miami Beach and I was in Naples. I never felt more like a meteorologist. I was at USF. Our station flooded because we were right on the Hillsborough River. I was sleeping on a yoga mat next to a max. We brought one max box, the TV graphic system, and that was connected to their, um, student TV channel. So, if the station I was working at went down, we were broadcast, we were joking around, I was reporting out in the field, but I was also the designated survivor. If the station went down, I was gonna broadcast me. A max box and a microphone, that would be it. The station didn't flood in that one, thankfully, but sleeping on a yoga mat, eating a wheel of cooler filled with Cuban sandwiches, very Tampa. That was like a wow, this is a very real thing. Some of it is weather, folks, and you get excited to see all these things on satellite and radar and you're wowed by nature, but you also have to consider there are real world impacts to these things. including when you live in these places to your family and friends and Your community. Absolutely. Let's go to a lighter note now, because little known fact, you've actually done some space weather stuff and you got to cover the SpaceX Falcon Heavy launch in 2018. Tell me what that experience is like, because first off, that's a pretty cool experience seeing a rocket launch. And how did that work? Merging your meteorology background with space weather reporting and space Yeah, that's something about this business. They call it Station Scientist. It's typically the meteorologist that's going out and doing science reporting for the station. And when I was down in Florida, I was very lucky to do a bunch of space reporting. I was there for both the GOES launches, which is cool because I show it on Fox Weather every day, the GOES satellite, 16 and 17. It was R and S at that point. We get to go into a clean room. So it reminded me of Armageddon when they're getting the astronauts ready. And you have the folks that are helping everybody get in the space suits and everything, and you see pictures of that and the video from like the Apollo program and everything we went through that process. And it was basically like only my eyes popping out and we got to be, I was like 10 feet away from both of those satellites as they were preparing to effectively load them onto, those were five rockets, ULA launched those, but to see a satellite that we look at the data literally every day of my life, I see data from GOES and it's in geostationary orbit like 23, 000 miles. Above our thing. It's like 22 5 above our head, just looking down at us. I was 10 feet away from it and then watched that satellite leave Earth, both of them, but the, that was the satellites. Falcon Heavy was the I, I don't know that I'll ever see something. Starship does look pretty cool, but that it launched from Pad 39 A and that would've had Elon's Tesla Roadster as a payload with the star man a little. suit, which I believe is like way cleared Mars at this point. Tesla roads is still flying out there in the solar system. It launches and people pad 39 a like all of the manned lunar missions launched from there. It it's historic. Most of the shuttle missions launched from there. It has that sound suppression system, the water sprays on it. So Falcon heavy was the biggest rocket to leave earth at the time. Since the Saturn five, the Apollo missions, And it left the pad and I was, man, I thought that would be louder. And it was the sound suppression system. And then it clears the tower and starts to go into the roll and the engines were pointed at our chest. And it was like, Oh, like, okay. Like, Holy moly, there it is. And it takes off the two boosters effectively. They're like full size Falcon nine rockets peel off. Second stage lights up and the two boosters, you could see him re entering. The engines were firing and it was like watching Superman. I would think that would be like, they came in hypersonic and it went across the sky like that. And then they lit him up, landed simultaneously back at Cape Canaveral. Double sonic boom and it hit the Vehicle Assembly Building, which is that giant cube that has the American flag and NASA on it. hits it and the, the sonic booms in such close proximity, hitting a giant cube, sounded, it was like the weirdest sound I've ever heard in my life. It like a whammy bar on a guitar, like wow, wow, wow. Oh, and it bounced back toward the press mound and then those two rockets land simultaneously after coming back from space. Obviously, the degree of professionalism that you have to have on the press. A bunch of media members covering this launch, and I was lucky to be one of them. I look at the guy next to me, won't say what outlet, and he just goes, holy F. And I said, yeah, like we, everybody was stunned. It was just like this super raw response from everybody because you honestly couldn't believe what you were seeing. And it was like watching science fiction. So for me, like I said, that's the, that's the coolest thing I've ever seen. And unless I see like Starship come back from orbit or something and land, even that the, the fact that they came in synchronized hypersonic with a sonic boom and then landed together, I don't know, it'll be hard to top. It was incredible. Hey, maybe you'll be able to report on Starship one day in the future. Hope so. We'll see it seems like they're having some success. Yeah, we haven't even talked about your stuff at Fox weather your podcast storming the field Yeah, we've got a lot to talk about with Ian Oliver on the podcast. So stick it here We'll be right back after a quick break on this day in weather history. We go back to January 27th 1922 to revisit one of the most Devastating winter storms hit the capital of the United States. The Knickerbocker storm, a powerful blizzard from January 27th to 29th of 1922, left an incredible mark on Washington, DC and the surrounding region. This storm set snowfall records and led to one of the deadliest single day disasters in the city's history. Forever changing how we approach building safety and winter preparedness. The stage was set for a historic winter event as an arctic air mass settled over the northeastern United States, with cities like Washington D. C. experiencing below freezing temperatures since January 23rd. A developing storm near the Georgia coast would take advantage of the frigid air in place. This storm quickly intensified as it moved north and parallel to the Atlantic coastline. Heavy snow began to quickly fall from the Carolinas to Pennsylvania, as the storm continued to drag north to the outer banks of North Carolina on January 28th. A strong high pressure system to the north of the system would force the Knickerbocker storm to move slowly north, taking the storm three days to move up the east coast of the United States. Because the travel time was double what forecasters were expecting, the storm was allowed to blast the eastern United States with heavy snow and high winds for several days, and not many people were prepared for that. In Washington, D. C., heavy snow quickly accumulated across the metropolitan area, with up to 28 inches of snow being reported. Railroads from D. C. to Philadelphia were covered by up to 3 feet of snow, with snow drifts as high as 16 feet being reported. In downtown D. C., the Knickerbocker Theater, the largest movie house in the capital, quickly accumulated heavy snow on its flat roof. With the storm raging on the evening of January 28th, the theater showed the movie Get Rich Quick Wallingford, with several hundred people in attendance. Shortly after 9 p. m. during the movie's intermission, the roof of the Knickerbocker Theater collapsed, bringing down the roof, the attached balcony, and significant portions of the brick walls. A major military, police, and firefighter response went underway to rescue people from the frigid cold and snow mixed rubble, with Army Major and future World War II General George S. Patton leading the emergency response. Unfortunately, a total of 98 people died, and 133 people were injured from the collapse of the theater. The snowstorm that caused the theater to collapse would continue to bring significant snow to the rest of the eastern United States. It remains one of the worst snowstorms in Washington, D. C. history, not just for its record snowfall, but for the tragic loss of life it caused. The disaster led to significant changes in building codes and safety regulations across the country, mandating better building materials and more substantial building supports to withstand such heavy snow events. The slow moving, nameless storm would later take the name of the Collapse Theater. And would be remembered as the Knickerbocker storm. Hey there. And welcome back to the everything weather podcast. I'm your host, Kyle, David. And today we're joined by Ian Oliver. He's a meteorologist at Fox weather, the host of Fox weather now, and the sports weather podcast, storming the field. We've got a lot to talk about with his stuff at Fox weather, the podcast that he's doing. But first Ian, I have another fun game for you. All right, let's do it. You have 15 to create a team that discusses the weather. For sports games and a little bit of the sports action itself. All right. So you're creating a team. You're the lead meteorologist and the main sports panelist. You're going to create a panel of meteorologists and reporters that talk about the weather and sports. Storming the field a little bit. Basically, yeah, you're building out the storm in the field with 15 bucks. Absolutely. So you're building out that storm in the field podcast into a TV show. Cool. Let's do it. And you have 15 to spend across five categories. So there's a little bit of budgeting that you gotta do. You can splurge out on like a couple of them, but then you gotta go low with the other one. A little strategy. This is very IG, like building an NBA roster. Exactly like that. Alright, first up. You have your second meteorologist and second host. For 1 you get a meteorology student from whatever meteorology school. For 2 you get Steve Jerv at Tampa, I believe. Jervy, that's my guy. Steve Jerv. My mentor, my old chief. Alright, for 3 you have Steve Bender. For 4 you have Jim Cantore. And 5 is your choice, excluding the people I just mentioned. I'm lucky to have two awesome Steves in the mix. Jim, another Linden State graduate as well, shout out Linden State. Steve Jerby is my mentor and I don't think I would be here without him. He gave me so much of his time and guidance. But polishing me up, so it's all love to Steve, but Steve Bender is my literal co host and my buddy, so I have to show love and keep the, keep us rolling on Storm in the Field. So you're going with Steve Bender as your second meteorologist and host. Three bucks is a deal, too. There you go. Alright, so you got 12 left. Next category is Field Meteorologist slash Reporter. For 1 you get an intern. 2 you get Max Gordon, who you've worked with on Fox before. 3 you get Robert Ray. 4 you get Mike Seidel. 5 is another your choice. Wow. Um, these are the people I mentioned. These are all people that I've got to work with for the low price of on the house as well. The whole zero dollars. Max is the man. He's over at Fox Business now, but we still get to see him. I think that dude has the calling within him, the weather calling. He loves it. So I know he's doing what he wants to be doing, but he misses reporting on the weather a little bit. He'd be great. Seidel is obviously a legend. We've talked about his career. So is Robert Ray. Robert Ray. Robert at three bucks with, I, he's the obvious choice because he's a sports nut and this is a sports weather show. You said to build out, he was just tailgating and South Bend for the Notre Dame CFP game last week. Just in his element. He's a lunatic in the best of ways. I say that with love. It's gotta, it's gotta be Robert Ray. Robert Ray, alright, for 3. You have 9 left. Yeah, I'm moving right, this is a great, this team, and it's economical so far. It's gonna be a little challenging for the, the last categories we got. So, we'll see. Next up you have a football analyst, so they're gonna be involved with discussion and play by play commentary. For 1 you get Booger McFarland. Two dollars, you get Rex Ryan. Three, you get Michael Strahan. Four dollars, Tony Romo. Five dollars, Troy Ackman. Yeah, Tony Romo. Ooh, I don't know, Jim. Romo's a golfer, too. We have three guys that golf on the team already. I think I'll do a little mini splurge here, and we'll bring the Dallas star into the mix, and we'll go Tony Romo. Tony Romo, okay, for four dollars. Alright. That'll bring the handicap of our Team down to who because I think he's like a scratch golfer. Steve's a good golfer, too I'm very average. I think Robert is in the same place as me. All right next up This one's gonna be a little challenging as well for you. Probably we have retired football athletes So specifically players who have recently retired in the last 10 15 years So, for 1 you get Chad Okosinko, 2 you get Terrell Owens, 3 Dion Sanders, 4 Tom Brady, and for 5 you get the special Peyton and Eli Manning duo. Wow! You get the BOGO for 5? Yeah, but if you do 5 you don't have any for the last category. Right. There's too much value at 4 for the GOAT. I'm a New Englander. Tom Brady is the greatest of all time. And, and now he's broadcasting too. I mean, I suppose all of them are, but yeah, for me, that's a absolute no brainer. Tom Brady is so much my guy that during the pandemic, my wife won the healthcare worker lottery when we were down in Tampa and saw Tom Brady beat Pat Mahomes and the Chiefs in that weird COVID Super Bowl. She was in attendance next to like a cardboard cutout of a cat. She gets to see the weekend and Miley Cyrus and she was excited. She does not, she's not a football fan, but my birthday that year was when, you know, everybody was in lockdown and she ordered a cardboard cutout of Tom Brady to be at the birthday party. So if there was a cardboard cutout with Tom Brady at my birthday party, he's on the team regardless of the price. So that leaves me with two bucks. I'm at, I'm at your mercy in the last category. Actually, you're at one, so Tom Brady is four. Tom Brady is a Fox employee now, too, so I should get a coupon. That should be like, two bucks. I don't know if we could do coupons with this game, but we'll say you have that one extra dollar to, you can either get a one dollar thing from the other categories, or you can upgrade one of the categories to another higher level tier. Let's go to the last one. See what I get for a dollar, because I like where I'm at with the first four. Alright, so, last category was guest celebrity. So, for one dollar you get whoever your local icon is in your hometown. For two dollars you get Bill Hader. Three dollars you get Oprah Winfrey. Four dollars you get Dwayne The Rock Johnson. Five dollars is your choice of any celebrity, including players. You know I can't Afford Oprah or The Rock. That's not happening. Bill Hader is awesome, too. Bill Hader is the absolute man, but not a local. I could finesse this cause as a New England guy, it should be like Ben Affleck, Casey Affleck, Matt Damon, Mark Wahlberg. Does that count? Ooh, there we go. Okay. I like your thinking. Let's go with, what would you pick for that 1 slot? Hmm. You get that bargain, dude. John Krasinski, I believe. Chris Evans. I feel like I made this easy, because then you could pick anybody from New England. I know. And that, Ben Affleck is probably the most ride or die of the Boston sports fans. So I'm gonna, I'll roll with Ben. Okay. Ben Griswold is an absolute finesse, too. All right. All right. So we have the final storming the pot, uh, storming the field. TV show that Ian is launching. You've got Steve Bender. You've got Robert Ray. You got Tony Romo. You've got Tom Brady and Ben Affleck. That's a loaded team there. Yeah, it's like a Dunkin Donuts commercial. Why not? Minus Matt Damon, of course. Yeah, we need Matt Damon. Absolutely. All right. Let's get back into the conversation, because we haven't even scratched the surface about your stuff at Fox Weather, your, what you do now, covering the national scale weather, the Storming the Field podcast. So as we build into that, let's first introduce Fox Weather. What do you do there? So for me, what's been the most compelling thing about my job here is that When I was working in local, I would be doing just weather, which is most of what we do at Foxwell is really a weather news platform. And part of the news aspect of that is us carrying the hosting element to that where I was not an anchor or host in my previous gig. So that was a skillset that I got to learn here. And it's actually, I didn't know necessarily that I would like it, but I knew it was something that I wanted to try out. And it's actually like, My favorite part of the gig at this point is talking to people, interviewing folks, learning people's stories, finding out new things every day, but actually carrying the show from a hosting standpoint has been the most exciting part of this. So that's what we're doing. Obviously we're tracking the weather. everywhere across the country every day, but that's not all of what Fox weather is, is telling the weather story of the day and getting folks up to speed on that. So that's been a really cool thing. That was starting off. Been lucky to be here since Fox weather's birth and be on the air on launch day and finding out about it was like, is this an app? Is it a website? Is it a TV network? Is it? A fast channel, which I didn't even know what that was. Free ad supported television. It's way too many acronyms, but that is an important acronym now in this business, it's all those things and more, and it's continued to grow and evolve and, and spread into all these areas of need because the TV industry and media as a whole has been this weird transitional. Hybrid space at this point. And, and that to me is part of what's so cool about being a part of Fox weather, because again, like credit credit to this company that they've been staying on the forefront of, of the innovation right now and how the industry is changing and you don't innovate. You're not going to be around to be, to be quite honest. So it's been exciting to see all that happening in real time and to be a part of it. Uh, just one, one small part of the big team at Fox weather. I I'm proud of it. To be honest, I have a lot of pride in. And what we've built out last three and a half years already. It's very exciting what you guys have built over there. And I'm curious because you cover the national weather and before you had a lot of experience with different local areas of weather. So, what's been the most rewarding and challenging thing for you adapting to national weather storytelling? So, especially early on, they did do a good job of grabbing folks from all different Backgrounds and regions in the first year, especially as we were figuring out what was what leaned on each other a lot. We get this wonderful group of people in front of and behind the scenes here at the camera. Like for instance, I've never lived out West. I've been an East Coast guy. We talked about various latitudes for sure, but I've always been in the Eastern half of the country. I share an office with Craig Herrera. He spent effectively his whole career Rockies West. So it's almost like the app is like the mirror image of what my career has been. And he can talk to me about New England stuff and Southeast stuff and hurricane stuff. And I'm asking him about the topography in the Sierra Nevada and the valleys, how they act in California, and he has this vast knowledge about all that stuff. So you lean on each other a bit and take everyone's different skill sets and try to make them into a more merged, well rounded team. And I'm curious, since you're a New England guy, can you tell me about an experience where you contributed your own local expertise to the Fox weather team? For, for me here, yes, of course, there's been winter storm and winter forecasting, but that is, you can say fun. It's more fun. It's lower stakes. Like folks need to be aware of that. There are obvious hazards from winter weather, but it's nothing like tropical. And, um, You know, having a half a dozen seasons down in Tampa, learning from a guy like Steve Jervie, like we mentioned, that has been a huge asset to take with me here to Fox Weather. Because, unfortunately, we had this past season, which was crickets through the middle of it, and the whole back half of the season was just brutal, relentlessly. So, being a part of our tropical coverage. Using something like Irma, for instance, or Hermine, Ada, some of the littler storms, knowing how storm surge prone the Tampa Bay area was, and then being deployed to Tampa Bay to cover Helene, being able to use some of that local knowledge, I mean, being back local, it felt like a homecoming of sorts, but it was scary too, because I knew. what the forecast was and what that would produce. And it ended up being a record surge in the Tampa Bay area. So many of my buddies still live there. I got one buddy that flooded saltwater surge from Helene and then flooded freshwater from Milton and just like knowing the again, like the real world impacts of what these forecasts mean when we're communicating them on the air. It just gives, helps you give the appropriate contact and energy to the story. You mentioned that it was a little bit of a homecoming for you. Has there been a homecoming moment for you for the New England area where you had to cover weather in the area you grew up in? So not in Massachusetts, but definitely Vermont. I was there for a little bit more than seven years between Linden State and Champlain Valley. So I mean, that place is home to me and being back there for the flooding that took place in Montpelier definitely felt. Like my, my Northeast homecoming experience. I haven't been out to, honestly, it's like, if we could actually get some snow, I get, we managed to squeak out this white Christmas in New York city, but for my parents down on the South coast of Massachusetts, these have been some thin winters. Be nice to go back there and actually. Cover a snowstorm on the beach or something, but we'd have to have an actual snowstorm to exist to cover so inevitably it'll happen But it hasn't happened yet. Yeah, it's been all thin on snow in the Northeast Yeah, it's been light. We're due though. We're due for a good one. First year, Fox weather, I remember being stuck to a bench on the Jersey shore. There was like 19 inches of snow. I was sitting there. It was my first time on the Jersey shore. I just moved back up and it was like, yikes, that was a proper coastal snowstorm, but I don't think we've had one like that. Since I was 21. Just curious. Do you remember where the Jersey Shore you were? Where was I? You know, I think I've only been back once since. Where was I? Man, I was on the boardwalk. I can't remember all these things go by. That's terrible. Um, Well, you've had a lot of different weather events going on, so it probably just got like blurred in the Yeah, it got purged. On a lot of weather stuff you're covering. My, my limited hard drive space, it must have gotten purged. Exactly. No, I was just curious, I'm a Jersey native, so. Yeah. I have to look at my, I am such a sucker now for the photos app, and then when you go to the location, that helps me figure everything out. I was in Long Branch, that's where I was. Okay. On the beach in Long Branch. Long Branch is a decent beach. Very happy to be there. And I'm curious, because you grew up in New England, and New England is known for its big coastal storms, nor'easters. Yeah. How did that experience compare to some storms that you've experienced up there? You know, it's just different. Different regions, different personalities. When I was 19, I was at Linden. And, uh, I spent the summer working in Alaska on a fishing boat. It was a salmon catcher processor. And, experiencing some of the storms out in the Pacific. We were based out of Kodiak. Like, living on a fishing boat for the summer. Like, inevitably gonna get into some bad weather. Even that had like a whole different flavor and personality. Obviously, it was cold even though it was summer. So, yeah, you just got to be there. You gotta be in one. Feel what it feels like, see what it looks like. Then that kind of helps you communicate that storytelling, not all dissimilar to a format like this, just bringing people into the mix and then sharing the experience. Interesting, that you bring that up. Now, going back to Fox weather, even though you've been there for only a few years now, I'm curious, what's been the most interesting story that you've covered there so far? Man, there have been so many. Because, I mean, it's a big country and something is always happening somewhere weather wise. Unfortunately, often times it's It's super devastating weather events. And sometimes, just the bright aspect of that, seeing how the communities come together. Then you have these weird Funky periods where, like for instance, earlier this year, we had the eclipse and we had the earthquake. And as people were looking up, people were looking down in the New York, New Jersey area, the whole New York metro. So we're talking about this once in a generation, once in a lifetime eclipse, then all of a sudden the ground starts rumbling and everybody feels like it's the end of all things. If that just goes to speak to it. It's always something new and different, and it keeps me engaged, keeps me plugged in. I'm glad you brought that up, because that was a very interesting time, where we had the eclipse, and then the earthquake, and I can't help but mention all the people on social media saying, Oh, this is some sort of conspiracy theory. Like it was correlated. Yeah, and there have been a couple of cases like that this year, and social media has really brought that rise up a little bit because everybody can now put out their theories and stuff. You probably have, you have drones over your head right now? Drones, right now, as we're recording this, yeah. How do you address that as a meteorologist, those conspiracy theories, fringe theories, misinformation, all those different things on social media? That's hard, and it's frustrating, and it's Part of the gig at this point, part of the challenge is combating misinformation, disinformation. It exists, I mean sometimes we will just outright address it if it has that much legs on social media because you want people To understand what's what, and there are so many different places to get information these days. It's part of, we talked about with Foxweather's business model, we're everywhere. And that's not a coincidence, because you have to be everywhere people want convenience. A billion spots you can get information on your phone. If it's the easiest and it's the loudest, it's what most people are consuming. So you have to be aware of that. You need to be calm, you need to be informative, and you need to be entertaining. You have to want people to want to seek you out for a trusted and entertaining news source. And if you build out that relationship, hopefully we can be fact checkers. If folks see some crazy stuff, wherever they come back home, in a sense, come back home to us, hopefully. And see what, see what we're saying, what we're thinking about it. And then if we have that attention, you have to have respect for that. And I use that wisely to communicate correct information or at least the best forecast that we have. Absolutely. And speaking to what you said about bringing entertainment with it as well. You do the storming the field podcast, which includes elements of entertainment. It brings a connection between sports and weather Talk to me a little bit about getting that started up What was that like connecting the sports to the weather that I always say like my tired line Is that like I'm a sports guy trapped in a weather guy's body Um, if I could just talk about sports all day, I'd be just fine with that. But weather and sports, I mean, you're already talking, we weren't even talking about storm in the field. You're talking about golf and wind earlier and every so much of sport, at least the most memorable games had like huge weather impacts. It literally impacted the outcome of the matchup. And we live in this fantasy football, sports wagering parlay era. People are looking for value anywhere they can get it, any little edge. And oftentimes, weather's got a legit impact on that. So we developed a metric, we call it the ROE, the risk of weather impact. We have low, medium, and high, and we talk about for whatever sporting event it is, what we think the impact on it is going to be and why, backing it up with a forecast. And then it's also a good excuse just to chat with some fun guests, have some conversations like this with cool. People from the sports world that have had interesting sports weather stories. It's one of the best parts of storming the field, listening to some of these cool experiences that all these folks have had. We've been lucky to have some amazing guests. So just to get some of those takes, get some of those stories, reminisce on some of the events past. It's been really fun. It's exciting and stuff like that doesn't feel like work. We're just talking about sports and weather. We're having a good time doing it. They say if you enjoy what you do, you never work a day in your life. That sounds like you've exactly found that. Yeah. With storming with storm in the field. I mean, yeah. And all things you have to, you want to love what you do. You have to at least like it to an extent in that you can have positive energy and perspective. to the gig, and it's super easy to do with something like Storm in the Field. Absolutely, and you were talking about some of the stories that you enjoyed listening to. What's been the most surprising weather sports story or connection that you've learned in the podcast so far? You know, let me see. I have to think back to, like, even the first episode. We started with Melvin Gordon. Melvin Gordon III, NFL running back, that was our first episode and it stuck with me in the sense that he said in bad weather games as a running back, and you're thinking about the defensive players, he said, I know where I'm going. They don't. So in his mind, it was advantage him. Like, you could easily have someone that says, Oh, I don't have my footing. I can't cut. I, that, that puts me at a disadvantage, but he was embracing it in the sense of the defensive players are dealing with the same problems I am. But I have the benefit of knowing what I'm trying to do and I can execute, you know, so just getting into some of the mindsets and then we were lucky to have Boomer Esiason. He obviously we have been watching his NFL coverage and his playing career, either his playing career or his coverage through my entire life. And, uh, he was joking around. He's like, man, every time I turn on my TV, the first thing that pops up on my smart TV is Fox weather and I. I watch you guys for tropical coverage. I'm like, wow, you know, like I've spent so much time watching Boomer and it's such a huge uh compliment and then just to use that connection to get into listening to some of the stories and some of the initiatives that he's been on the forefront of through his amazing career and It's just an excuse to have a conversation and you never know what's going to come out of a conversation and most of the time it's amazing stuff that you, uh, you can, I know you put a lot of work into this podcast and you plan so much and then you actually get into a conversation with someone. And it just goes in some direction that you didn't know it would go, you couldn't plan for, and it ends up being the most compelling part of it. Absolutely, and to speak to that, I think that's the most fun part about doing a podcast. Just talking to people, seeing where the conversation goes. Yeah, totally. And talking a little bit about your weather sports connection, I'm curious. If there was a sports event that you could cover that was impacted by the weather, you could go back in time and cover that event? What would you pick? Man. And you get Bender, of course. Oh, maybe we could do the tuck rule game. We could lean into the, the, the haters who knows, man. I mean, Fox is the world cup coming up in 26 as a soccer guy. That's going to be super amazing. So, I mean, it depends how miserable you want to be. Remember a couple years back, uh, Mac Jones is still a quarterback of the Pats and they're playing in western New York against the Bills and they had that game where the wind was blowing so hard that Mac threw the ball like three times. Like, that would be an example of high ROWE, a high risk of weather impact. What was that? Tigers finishing up in darkness. He drops one, what tournament was that? He just sticks one on the green. Everybody goes crazy. So many, I remember the Valhalla at Louisville. It had poured down rain. It was a PGA championship. Rory ended up winning that PGA. I had gone to, I think the day before Saturday, it was moving day, and his ball would have went in the drink and instead it plugged on like a Slope any time any other time it would have bounced in but it plugged instead and it was looked clean in place He got to put it down and he won the PGA. So it's just like breaks like that what weather dictates That could be a whole different podcast. I have to, like, go back and look, but there's been a billion super awesome weather games. There's, there really is a lot, especially with the NFL, with golf. There's just so many out there. And, by the way, I just want to take a moment to, like, for my listeners, if you haven't listened to the Storm of the Field podcast, it's a very interesting take on connecting the weather to sports. So, go give it a listen, give it a check out. Thanks, man. There's a lot of different connections with the weather, but I think you guys do it very well over there. Now, going back to what you said earlier about Fox Weather's business model, you're on the forefront of building things, and I gotta admit, it's a very interesting time with digital and social media, with all these different things coming out, AI, visual reality, all these other things that allow us to tell the weather story in so many different ways and communicate that information. And also get the information as well. What's a trend or innovation in weather broadcasting that has you the most excited? Man, we had the EIFS, the Euro AI model, crush it through this tropical season. It did really well on the track of a bunch of the storms. It'll be interesting to see how all of that evolves over the next five years. You know, five to ten plus. Those models work completely differently than numerical weather prediction, which is complicated. equations and in representing the processes that are occurring in the atmosphere in a numerical sense. And it's like super computationally intensive. Takes a lot of time. It takes a lot of money to run those supercomputers. Where the AI is pattern recognition and you can run models way faster for way less money. So I'm interesting to see how all of that plays out. The science folks are like, Oh, are you worried about AI this and that? And so many industries or folks are like, yeah, this is scary as hell. To be honest, I think it's going to help the science. And I'm excited about that. And I just don't see any time soon from a communication standpoint. It replacing us to be, I just don't see that in the sense that some of the things that we've talked about it, like drawing on personal experience and like living through weather events and talking about what people can reasonably expect. I just don't see machine learning replacing the people, the human side of it in the communication sense anytime soon. And I'm excited about it. I, I'm, I'm terrified of it in a thousand other aspects of my life and our society, but from a job standpoint, I'm excited about the, the scientific aspect and the forecasting side of it. And I'm not that worried about the communication side right now. Maybe I'm a knucklehead and I'll be that and you know. Hopefully it's not a, not to overuse the joke, but hopefully it's not a Skynet future. Terminators take over? I be, yeah, that, that, I'm, I'm more terrified of that in a societal sense than I am in a job sense. Exponential, this has been, and it didn't come out of nowhere. They've been working on this stuff for decades, it just came into the societal forefront the last few years. But, how fast it's all been happening through this last half decade is a little bit unsettling. But yeah, I mean. We said with Fox weather in the industry, it's innovate or die type scenario. That can be applied to the world in a much broader sense. So, I mean, we're innovating and you just got to innovate with it, you know, adapt. The whole Bruce Lee, be water thing. Bringing Bruce Lee in. Okay. That's a good quote. I like how you applied that. Um, and on that note, where do you see digital weather media going in the next year? Five years? If you want to be bold 10 years from now, 10 years, I have no idea. That's why I said you're bold. Yeah. Next five years. Again, like I I'm proud of what we're building here. I think it looks something like what Fox weather. Has become and is becoming. Being this omnipresent. We're on your phone, the TV, uh, articles, the stream. There's just a lot of different ways. People will always want to consume and need to consume weather information. So you just have to be, it will always keep working toward being the best option in that space, whatever somebody's choice is in that. Which is there with the app, the websim. So, yeah, that's gonna be that. We just have to make sure we're there. Little bit of anywhere, everywhere, all at once. I think there's a movie, right, that just came out? Everything Everywhere. Yeah, that movie ruled. That was a super awesome movie. Yeah. And just curious, do you see Foxweather growing on a platform that's not currently there? Do you think there's a new platform that's going to come out soon? You have to go exact, you have to go C suite. I'm just hosting the show three to six. But yeah, I like why our distribution team has done an incredible job. It feels like we're just about everywhere, but every day there's somewhere new. So surely it'll be some spot, some entity. Some platform and yeah, you just have to make sure we're available. Definitely. And before we get into the end of the interview and the tried and true segment of whether or not I leave it open to you, do you want to. Do you want to add anything that we missed? Do you want to bust any misconceptions about the weather, sports? I leave the floor to you. No, I mean, I think those, like, you mentioned Storm in the Field, we talked about that. I mean, that is the best marriage of those two things. That's my thing and Steve's thing and weather, our whole team has the unique backgrounds and wrinkles and different experiences and weather impact literally everything. So again, it's just, I talk a lot about that because it comes out of me. It's easy because I love it. So whatever your wrinkle is in weather, whatever you're interested in, just roll with it. And that could be, that could be too philosophical, apply it to any day life, find something interesting and connect it to something else. Alright, Ian, that is the end of the interview, but we've got one last fun segment for you. One for the road. This is whether or not we've got some weather themed, non weather themed questions that are going to test your trivia knowledge in both areas based on what you told me you're interested in. With that said, are you ready to kick it off? Let's do it. Alright, this is whether or not your question is related to tropical forecasting. In an average year, how many hurricanes form in the Atlantic Basin? Is it A, 3, B, 7, C, 10, or D, 12? Seven. Seven is your final guess? Yes, sir. You are correct, it is seven. Let's do it. This is whether or not your question is related to the New England Patriots. What quarterback did Tom Brady replace in 2001, eventually leading the Patriots to a Super Bowl championship? I'm sure you're going to know the answer, but I'll read the answer choices off. Is it A. Vinny Testaverde? Testa Verde. I've only owned two quarterback jerseys in my entire life. Number 12, Tom Brady. Number 11. Drew Bledsoe. Drew Bledsoe final answer. Drew Bledsoe's final answer? You are correct. It is Drew Bledsoe. The man. This is whether or not your next question is related to Star Wars. What color is Mace Windu's lightsaber? Is it A. Blue, B. Green, C. Yellow, or D. Purple? D. Purple. I think Samuel L. got that custom. I think he's the only dude that's had a purple lightsaber. Final guess? You are correct it is purple and you are also correct in that he specifically requested that yeah He's the only at the green like that. Yeah, he was like, can I get a purple lightsaber and George Lucas is like, okay Normally, they have blue and green but we can make it You talk about misinformation online. I saw something the other day on some social media that mace windows a mace window Survived his trip out the window. So who knows there's a lot of fan art literature out there I mean a bit tough to survive, but maybe that I mean if chancellor palpatine or emperor palpatine came back Who knows what whatever is possible? That's an excellent point. Yeah, good point. I'm not sure that I subscribe to the events of the I'll say I don't really subscribe to them either. I kind of just ignore it. Alright, this is whether or not your next question is related to sports weather. Rescheduled to another day or moved to another venue outright. However, there has been very few times that the weather has caused an outright cancellation of an NFL game. Which of the following NFL games were canceled due to weather? And before I read, there are two correct answers here, so you get to pick two of these. Is it A. 2017 Governor's Cup with the Cowboys at the Texans. B. 2021 Cardinals at Saints. C. 2010 Giants at Vikings, or D, 1992 Patriots at Dolphins. Giants at Viking, what year did you say that was? 2010. That's when the Metrodome collapsed, isn't it? I think. I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go that as one of them. I think that was when the snow caved the roof in. Okay, so I'll give you a hint. All of these have had weather impact the games, but only two were cancelled games. So you are correct that the Metrodome did collapse in 2010. But did it cause a cancellation, though? I can't answer because that would then They moved that game somewhere else, if I remember. Yeah, no, I will go What was my other options again? So you have 2017 Cowboys at Texans, 2021 Cardinals at Saints, 2010 Giants at Vikings, and 1992 Patriots at Dolphins. Let's go Cowboys, Texans. I want to say that could have been Ice Storm or something like that. I'll lock that one in. 2017 Cowboys and Texans? You are correct, that is one of the cancellations. That was from Hurricane Harvey. Ah. There is another one there that is also caused a cancellation. Can you hit me with the other two besides the Metrodome one? 2021 Cardinals at Saints, and then there was 1992 Patriots at Dolphins. Was Let's go Cardinals, Saints, that would have been Ida? Final guess? You are correct, that is the second time the NFL game has been cancelled, and that was Hurricane Ida. 2010 was the Metrodome, 1992 was, uh, Hurricane Andrew. And they've moved the date of the game to later in the season, but you are correct. It is the 2017 Cowboys at Texans game and 2021 Cardinals at Saints game. This is whether or not your last question is related to Madden. Who was on the cover of Madden 2018? Is it A. Rob Gronkowski, B. Antonio Brown, C. Tom Brady, or D. Richard Sherman? 18, I don't, I don't know why. No, that would have been too, maybe late for Sherman. Gronk would have been, you said it was AB and Tom Brady is the other ones. So it's Robert Gronkowski, Antonio Brown, Tom Brady, and Richard Sherman. That might've been when they did the, the goat edition. I'll go Tom Brady. Tom Brady is your final guess. You are correct. It is Tom Brady on the Madden 2018 cover. I think he's the only one that has appeared on multiple covers because he's in 2021 with Pat Mahomes. Yes. With that said, that is the last whether or not question and the end of the interview. But before we go, how can people stay in touch with you and your work, Ian? You can find me, like I said, Fox Weather Now, 3 to 6 Eastern Time every day on Fox Weather. You can find us everywhere, foxweather. tv. Shows you the many options that you have and at Ian Oliver WX on IG and X and Facebook and, uh, all those places. All the other platforms. Yeah. And we'll make sure to link all of Ian's social media handles down in the show notes for you all. With that said, thank you so much to you, Ian, for coming onto the podcast. And thank you to the listener for listening to the Everything Weather podcast. And we'll catch you on the next episode. Hey, good deal, man. Great to catch up with you.