TV News Weather Coverage

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The mid-afternoon weather in Metro St. Louis has been tumultuous, violent, and dangerous. At the local television stations, they have a responsibility to cut into your favorite soap opera or divorce court show and keep you informed if you're in danger.

The question is, how much is too much? News Directors really can't win on this one, because someone will say they're wrong no matter what they do.

When the sirens stopped here at Olive and 270 and I got back to my computer, this is what I found.

With the tornado warning over in St. Louis City and County, Fox 2 had already returned to regular programming.

KMOV, was still on, dealing with the warnings as they moved into Illinois. They stayed live until 4pm, when they freely admitted they were dumping out to go to "The Young and the Restless." (Had they not, those soap opera viewers would have flooded their phone lines. An angry Y & R viewer will make you want to stand in front of a tornado!)

KSDK continued to stay live with their weather people until just past 4:20. Missouri was clear, but tornado warnings remained in Madison, St. Clair and Clinton counties on the Illinois side of the river. In other words, those folks were still in some danger. The warnings are serious.

The rule of thumb for many stations is to stay live on the air as long as there are tornado warnings for major portions of the viewing area. Of course "major portion" is open to interpretation, allowing newsrooms to stay on as long or as short as they deem necessary.

So what do you think? Were Illinoisans put in danger by the threat of angry loyalists of Judge Judy and Young and the Restless? Did Channel 5 play to our fears for way too long instead of just going back to Oprah and letting St. Louis breathe?

Thoughts?