NBC 5 Chicago

Looks like Patrick Fazio is off the morning shift and will only be on at 11am with Marion Brooks. I haven't seen an announcement for a new morning anchor so I wonder if it's in-house musical chairs. I was really starting to like Michelle and Patrick in the morning. Patrick can be quite funny however the chemistry was a little off with Michelle. I still think Michelle is best suited for evening/10pm news. https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=491049226172733&set=a.144880187456307

Chris Hush is moving to WTVJ-NBC 6 in Miami to be the weekend anchor and weekday reporter. Press release below.

Wow... their better option would be 8pm ET. Run their live programming through the day and then at 8pm is the rebroadcast of Pattrn then they can run their deep bench of reruns of shows. This also gives them an option if Pattrn didn't air that day due to severe weather they can run a show if severe weather isn't happening at 8pm or continue with live coverage. I actually like Pattrn. It's a really neat show and I like where they're going with it. You'll still get updates on weather across the country. The climate stories they are doing are quite interesting and informative.

Tyler Mauldin made his debut today on Storm Center. Looks like he freelances a lot at CNN/HLN and now TWC.

In Out & About it was posted that Tevin Wooten is going to NBC Boston. It explains why he hasn't been on air since the beginning of May. Now, I wonder if they'll replace him on Storm Center or just keep it Jacqui and Chris. Felicia posted on her socials that she was no longer going to be a regular on Weekend Recharge with May 21-22 being her last time as a regular on there. Curious to see if we'll see some shuffling around and if they'll hire anyone new any time soon. With the holiday weekend they've had a lot of the part time OCM's on to help fill the voids.

Explains why Tevin hasn't been on TWC since the beginning of May.

See regardless if its not dramatic as tornado coverage its still severe weather. That should ALWAYS be covered. I get your assumptions regarding the 10% and hatched tornado risk. Regardless there needs to be a better parameter for covering severe weather. If there are active tornado warnings and you're approaching going into programming hours they should pre-empt, period. That's the reason people turn to the weather channel anyways or at least used to. I know ways of getting warnings and keeping informed have changed since TWC formed but a channel devoted to weather should still be devoted to at least covering the severe cases of weather.

Looks like they've extended morning coverage to overtake the live edition of Pattrn today. There's an enhanced risk of severe weather but nothing like the past severe weather days so I'm curious why the change today. Wonder if WU will take over the 1pm hour for additional coverage and if there is extended overnight coverage or they just ended up scraping Pattrn for today.

They did break in twice so far to update the status of those storms. I don't know why they just didn't do another hour of Storm Center until things calm down then bring Carl in. Their severe weather coverage outside of their shows sucks anymore.

Don't get me started on the lights. Half the time Storm Center is blue and the other half its yellow, like today. Then we got T-Mobile for Pattrn which I feel is way overboard than the other shows. Samantha Mohr is on tonight during Storm Center. I forgot she was a fill in again. They've been going deep into the fill ins this week for coverage. Yet they had Felicia on yesterday during Pattrn but Molly at the beginning of the week. It'll be interesting to see who's going to be paired with Carl for the late night hours. But so far Mark, Jeff, Colleen, Samantha have filled in this week. Chris Bruin filled in for Alex Wallace on Monday even though Alex was there for the 40th anniversary. It's been an interesting week with the OCM's.

Interestingly today they are not showing Pattrn at all and running live storm coverage with Jen and Alex during the noon hour. I suspect Mike and Alex will take over at 1pm for an extended Weather Underground coverage. They're already advertising extended coverage for the evening and overnight so I suspect an added hour to Storm Center and then Carl Parker will do coverage late night. Yesterday was a higher outlook for Severe Weather than today so I'm surprised they went this route however there is already a Tornado Watch out so maybe that's why.

I've noticed this as well. Molly McCullum finally got upped to full time so I'm wondering if she took over Mark's spot. They don't see to hire a lot of full OCM's as they used to and they've seemed to be doing the Fox Weather route and have 3 OCM's on during their shows. I know usually its 1 Expert and 2 OCM's but Storm Center has 3. Tonight though is interesting on Storm Center. Chris Bruin and Jeff Morrow are on tonight. Last night it was Jacqui Jeras and Tevin Wooten, Chirs Warren was off. Normally Jeff fills in for extended coverage usually with Carl Parker in the overnight hours and usually just in the lab. Its nice to see him again interacting in the studio during a normal show. They do have a decent list of fill in OCM's that they tap during extended coverage. I noticed some have been on over the past few days. They do have an OCM job posted on their website so maybe its like every other industry across the country where the job force is just not there. But they've had quite of few people leave and not a lot have been hired or promoted to full time.

First Tornado watch is issued and bye bye jazz music. Indeed the alert music is playing. Looks like TWC en Español is using all the same music and graphics as the OG TWC from what little I saw of the stream. I was half hoping for today with the TWC en Español launch that they might do a graphics update across the board. They've been using the same graphics since 2013 with some updates here and there. While they have aged well I feel like now would have been a good time to do nice big update on the 40th anniversary.

I feel like the storm alert music is overused now. I remember when it was just for Storm Alert for hurricanes. I get sever snow storms or a huge outbreak but I feel they use it to use it sometimes. Also, I'm totally loving the jazz music back for the local on the 8s. I miss that. The only thing that stinks is the forecasts are only 1 min now and it was cool to have the longer 2 min flavors of the music back in the day.

Looks like Anita Blanton debuted this week anchoring the 9am hour of Good Day Chicago and the 12pm newscast with Sylvia Perez. https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=536128081216308&set=a.223779982451121

They were definitely live for the first hour today except for pre-recorded segments. Now the second hour the beginning was the exact same as the first hour but I didn't catch the whole hour to see if there were other live segments or just a complete re-run of the first hour.

Is it original? No. However, I'm not mad at it. It is different and unique. I get what they're trying to do. It'll be how they implement it and use the branding that we'll get an idea of it better.

I noticed that too. I figured maybe they were doing updates or something in the studio. So, there goes another 2 live hours of weather on TWC. One thing I noticed and its small but the pillows on the couch change for what show is airing. AMHQ = Yellow and Blue, Pattrn = Pink, Weekend Recharge = Teal and Blue. Like I said nothing worthwhile but it brings a different touch to the shows when they use the couch in addition to the different lighting.

TWC is debuting a new show today called Pattrn at 12pm ET. Hosted by Stephanie Abrahms and Jordan Steele. Info below from the email I got today: "Meteorologists Stephanie Abrams and Jordan Steele are hosting a daily Pattrn show on The Weather Channel. Every weekday at 12pm ET, learn about the climate’s impact on everyday life, meet the people who are working to find solutions, and find out simple tips on how to live more sustainably. Come join us!" This new show seems to be 2 hours running from 12pm-2pm ET on my guide. It looks like Weather Underground and Storm Center are now only 3 hours long. So the New Schedule (in ET Time): AMHQ - 5AM-12PM Pattrn - 12PM-2PM Weather Underground - 2PM-5PM Storm Center - 5PM-8PM I didn't watch AMHQ early this morning so I don't know if Jordan and Stephanie are still on AMHQ and this new show is in edition to them being on AMHQ. Jen Carfagno and Alex Wallace still host the later edition of AMHQ. While a new show is cool and all, more LIVE weather hours in the day would be a lot better. I was hoping they would shift everything later into the primetime hours. The shows they run from 8PM-5AM debut new episodes on the weekend. You could keep the weekend heavy with shows in the afternoon and evening but keep LIVE weather coverage running through at least 10PM ET during the week but I digress... EDIT: So the show is only an hour long with the next hour showing the same exact preceding hour. They go over hot topics in the beginning and have in-depth interviews centering on the environment and climate. Not much weather or forecast outside of the environmental and climate talk. Not sure if this is actually live or pre-taped. I think its live because they're using the main studio and the only time they'd have time to tape would be before AMHQ at 5AM.

Something tells me WMAQ isn't going to get a weather center any time soon. They've finally started using this area over the past few weeks for stand ups in addition to the other side of the studio. I've notice weather has only been done by chroma key. Another thing when Leila is done with sports she joins Rob, Allison and Stefan at the desk but in the evenings the meteorologists still do not. Just found it a little odd if you have one but not the other at the end of the newscast or after their report.

From FEDER. Joe Donlon moved from NewsNation to CBS 2. Effective May 2nd he'll anchor CBS 2 News @ 5, 6, and 10pm. Brad Edwards moves to CBS News Chicago streaming service and continues as investigative reporter.

So this confused me as well. It's been a couple months since I've regularly watched but it was Scott Schneider and Anita Padilla from 4am-9am then Sylvia anchoring at 9am with Terrance usually doing in studio reports. Rosanne usually field reported or fill in anchored if someone was off. Sylvia also anchors the noon news. They even have promos with Scott and Anita for Good Day. So I don't know why they're wanting to do a rotation of anchors unless they're wanting to do something like WGN and figure out a A and B team to break up Good Day hours. Test the chemistry between everyone and then announce a full schedule. I know I'm speculating but I can't figure out why they'd break up what they already have unless they want to tweak it.

It wouldn't be bad.. however it would be sad. TWC has been the original 24 weather station. What is has become is just plain sad. The only thing they've had great coverage of is hurricanes where they go 24 hours around the clock for days. They need to take that same approach to severe weather events. THEY KNOW WHEN THEY"RE COMING. I hope this is a wake up call for TWC to provide better service and coverage of severe weather going forward. Long form programing is fine. I like their shows but it should be later in the day or just on weekends. There needs to be more live weather coverage. With that said I've quite enjoyed Fox Weather and what they're trying to do. Their coverage of severe weather has outdone TWC a lot of the time. Once they get their staffing up and if they get on cable, they are going to be quite the competition for TWC if not supersede them.

Per Feder, NBC 5 has hired Juan Carlos Navarrete as a reporter and weekend morning anchor. He'll anchor alongside Kate Chapel Sunday mornings. I'm surprised they just didn't make it Saturday and Sunday mornings. They haven't had a weekend morning team in awhile.

I noticed in the first hour of weather underground they kept the couch area dark and covered it up but it was in some of the wide shots where Mike tossed to Mark and you could see it covered up. They uncovered it but kept the area darker then the rest of the set for the rest of the show. The couch isn't a bad idea. I just wish they could have made that area more universal where the couch could be removed and other elements added for other day parts so it can be utilized more. I'm not really keen on Storm Center. I guess I had high hopes but I prefer either Weather Underground or Weather Center Live style format. But I also wouldn't mind old school format of the original Weather Center either with your region by region forecasts, travelwise, weekly planner, and Storm Watch/Tropical Update. Weather Underground took awhile for me to like but I think for me its the hosts. I like Mike, Alex and Dr. Knabb. At least with Storm Center this is the first update format wise we've had in awhile.