Meteorology has been my passion since 2004. Why 2004, you ask? In 2004, Hurricane Ivan devastated Pittsburgh with flooding rains like never seen before. A local town, Carnegie, was affected the worst.
I was 11 years old when Ivan hit. I remember leaving the grocery store with my mom when she said, "boy it's raining a lot" and we were going home and the roads were barely passable. We got home and turned on our local station WPXI TV. The local news reporters were reporting record flooding was occurring due to this well former hurricane now tropical depression Ivan. I sat in front of the TV that day and watched over 7 hours of news coverage. The meteorologists using the storm tracker doppler 11 radar equipment and doing the live hits really fascinated me.
So, I wanted to start doing what they did on TV. I asked my dad to help me find some doppler radar software. Back in 2005, there were little to no software out there for student meteorologists. I finally came across a software called StormPredator. Back in 2005, it was one of the coolest softwares around.
I started tracking system using that software. I learned how to read a doppler and how to show people what was happening in their neck of the woods. I then found a software which was more broadcast professional called storm lab. The software allowed you to do manual storm tracks like on TV with custom colors of the radar and more. This software is still one of the widely-used softwares on the market today for any local meteorologist or national meteorologist.
The next software I added to my group of radar products was grlevelx. The suite of products has level 2 or level 3 data. The data all comes from the National Weather Service unless you have a contract with a company like Baron Services who supplies actual broadcast towers with radar domes for some good money. Usually contracts are 6 digits or more for a station. The grlevelx suite has been the most updated and widely used to date. The software has been upgraded to include national maps, futurecast maps and more. The software I use is uploaded to the web on my server, http://www.morleyjordan.com/weather/. The radar I have uploaded updates 24/7 throughout the day unless the PC decides to update without my consent. Microsoft is known for pushing updates at the absolute wrong times.
So now in 2016 what has changed? I use the software GR3, GR2AE, GRE for my main on air or social media accounts. I have gained over 930 followers on Twitter. My Twitter handle is @JordanMorleyTV. Always would love more followers to get the best forecasts out to the general public. I have learned to read weather models in the years since and upload every day my general forecast to the web using photoshop graphics created by a friend Tyler. He makes custom weather graphics and maps which even national stations use. With graduation coming up I will have a BA in TV/Radio and also 3D/VIdeo Productions. I do not hold a meteorologist degree yet, I plan to go to MSU online while working and getting my atmospheric meteorology degree and then apply for a full time on air position at a station.
I love what I do. It's my passion and I have a lot of friends who generally ask for the forecast. For example next week there is a potential winter storm coming up, and I have been trying to calm everybody due to the panic that has set in due to younger weather enthusiasts are uploading maps and saying oh this is the forecast when really it's not. There is a lot of science behind forecasting and it's not easy to just put up a forecast. It takes me up to an hour sometimes analyzing the data coming in and trying to understand each forecast path. That is one of the best parts of the job though. You get a challenge every day, if it's a sunny day you know it's not going to last too long, so you have to prepare for rain. There is always something that is coming up or down the pipeline.
