Reflecting on 50 Years of Broadcasting: Camille, Andrew, the Cone, Winter Storm Names, and Lessons for Future Storms

My first job in broadcasting came in the spring of 1968 – disk jockey at a small AM station on Florida’s east coast. That following summer Hurricane Camille was threatening Florida – my first hurricane advisory. Through the Big Thompson Flood, the Blizzard of ’78, and Atlanta’s Snow Jam in 1982, the hurricane’s stayed away from me, but then came the Great Hurricane of 1992 – Hurricane Andrew. I learned lessons galore that served me well through the hurricanes of the mid and late ‘90s and the great storms of the new century: Ivan, Katrina, Wilma, Ike, and Sandy, to name a few. Future storms await, but broadcasting has drastically changed, and communicating a coherent message has become more difficult. How can the lessons of the past 50 years be applied to communicating critical information during the great hurricanes yet to come?