While the forecasts aren’t always correct, it’s kind of amazing how we know how to predict the weather. Wondering if you need to pack an umbrella or maybe layer on a bit of sunscreen? All you have to do is watch the news while the helpful local weather people predict exactly what your local weather is going to be like.
However, there are a few things that even seasoned weather professionals can’t predict. This includes everything from issues with the station’s technology to the bonkers conditions they are reporting on. The final result is a series of on-air mistakes as egregious as they are hilarious.
Want to see what we’re talking about? Keep reading to discover the live weather bloopers that nobody could have predicted!
Prince Charles can’t take a joke
These days, Charles is the King of England, assuming England’s royal throne after the passing of Queen Elizabeth. Back in 2012, though, he was still “just” a prince and had a bit more time for public appearances. That was the year he stepped in to do the forecast for the BBC. He thought it was going to be your typical forecast, but it didn’t take too long for things to go off the rails.
That’s because someone had slipped plenty of cheeky humor into the script he was supposed to read. This included references to the weather conditions over assorted royal estates, including Balmoral. This was all meant to be in good fun, but Charles wasn’t laughing: he spent much of his time complaining about the humorous script. Viewers at home, meanwhile, grumbled about Charles’ poor reading of the teleprompter.
Good thing he’s a king, because he’d make for a lousy weatherman!
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Getting a prediction wrong in the worst possible way
We’ve all experienced moments when the weather predictions aren’t correct. Maybe your local weatherman called for a sunny day and you got stuck in afternoon showers, or maybe they predicted a cool morning and you woke up to a scorcher. Still, these are relatively minor things that don’t affect people all that much. Unfortunately, Michael Fish had the dubious honor of getting a prediction wrong in the worst possible way.
Back in 1987, he answered a phone call from a woman who was worried about the weather getting worse. Sounding cool and professional, he calmly told her that she had nothing to worry about. There was just one problem: that was the day of the Great Storm of 1987, whose cyclone killed dozens of people and caused billions in damage. Arguably, damage might have been less extensive if Fish hadn’t told the nation there was no hurricane to worry about. The shame of this has followed Fish for years, but he had more humor about the matter than Charles: after all, he relived this moment for a 2012 seafood promotion, this time giving an accurate forecast.
Accidentally giving viewers the finger
did. In most cases, it usually involves an unexpected mistake that happens during the live production of the broadcast. Perhaps the best example of this is what happened to Tomasz Schafernaker when fellow reporter Simon McCoy joked that the weatherman’s predictions had not been very accurate lately.
In response, Schafernaker flipped his colleague the bird. It wasn’t meant as anything serious…just a little light ribbing among coworkers. But Scafernaker didn’t realize that the camera was still rolling and that he had just given the middle finger to everyone watching! He did a poor job of covering the incident and looked horrified at what he had done. The BBC was certainly horrified, and they subsequently apologized to viewers for the unprofessional newsroom
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She just couldn’t stop laughing
We sometimes feel more sympathy for certain weather people than others. For example, the middle finger incident with Tomasz Schafernaker could have been avoided if he had just double-checked whether the camera was still on or not. However, poor Louise Lear experienced the kind of moment on air that she couldn’t control, and that most of us can sympathize with. You see, she just couldn’t stop laughing!
It all started when it was her time to give the weather forecast. Instead of telling viewers what to expect, though, she began giggling and just could not contain herself. This was doubly surreal because the forecast called for nasty wind and rain in both Scotland and Ireland. Eventually, she muddled through, but this incident is a reminder of why so many people hate speaking in front of others.
Simply put, anything can (and often does) go wrong!
When the forecast goes to crap (literally)
The weirdest thing about Louise Lear’s giggling fit is that nobody ever figured out what set her off. In the case of Carol Kirkwood, though, it was pretty obvious what made her nearly lose her composure on the air. She was on location at West Wittering and reporting on a nasty heat wave. Shortly before she could finish filming her segment on the beach, a local dog wandered up.
There’s no delicate way of saying this: the dog proceeded to defecate all over the beach. Impressively, Carol offered no reaction even though she looked mortified. The same couldn’t be said of those sitting on the BBC Breakfast sofa as they began cackling over the forecast going (quite literally) to crap!
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