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America's Next Top ThunderstormThe 100 Biggest Weather Moments.

By Troy PattersonPosted Thursday, April 12, 2007, at 6:40 PM ET

100 Biggest Weather Moments. Wonya Lucas, the head honcho at the Weather Channel, has declared it her goal "to expand the definition of weather by taking advantage of all its dimensions." Part of the job is to make weather fun, feisty, glamorous—to make barometric pressure the new black. Thus does 100 Biggest Weather Moments (this Sunday through Thursday at 8 p.m. ET) apply the countdown-special formula to the elements.

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The host, somehow aptly, is Harry Connick Jr. The guests are superstars, scientists, cult heroes, kitsch figures, celebrity weatherpersons, and fabulous cranks who file in to chat, as Connick says, about "the moments that inspired the human spirit, changed the way we think about our world, and, yes, even broke our hearts." No, his producers aren't shy about overreaching, which is only to be expected from a special whose bold logo and martial theme music are appropriate to a Super Bowl broadcast.

In fact, the countdown kicks off on the gridiron: At No. 100, football coach Don Shula laments his Dolphins' 3-0 loss to the Patriots during a blizzard on Dec. 12, 1982. The Patriots were able to score the field goal only because their snow-plow driver cleared a spot for the place-kicker during a timeout. "What I should have done in retrospect," says Shula, "is run out onto the field and throw myself in front of the snow plow." A sportscaster—Bob Costas, of course—tosses in the fact that the plow guy was a convicted criminal on a work-release program, and because the photo researchers on 100 Biggest Weather Moments are diligent and inventive, we get a glimpse of his mug shot. It's a telling place to start, this misty sports-bar memory. The show loves small, deep trivia and tribal factoids. It makes a compelling meal from the variety meats of history's buffet.

Making a sharp turn to the highbrow, we somehow arrive at a discussion of cold air, spruce wood, and the tonal quality of Stradivarius violins featuring Itzhak Perlman. Getting serious at No. 98, we revisit the severe flooding of the Midwest in 1993. The first hour also finds Dan Rather looking at William Henry Harrison's inauguration, the wine columnists of the Wall Street Journal exploring the Paris Wine Tasting of 1976, and, in a tribute to the invention of the hygrometer, both Al Sharpton and Mary Hart discussing bad hair days. The Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale gets an explication, as do the Battle of Dunkirk, the dimples on a golf ball, and the social history of the umbrella. The dork appeal is limitless.

One must suppose that Thursday's hour of 100 Biggest Weather Moments will find Connick talking about his New Orleans and its Katrina. But the episode will have to be leavened with something: Pamela Anderson holding forth on the history of the tan line? John Lahr and Liza Minnelli exchanging parental reminiscences about tornadoes? As for the top spot, my money's on the biblical flood, commentary by Billy Graham.

Once 100 Biggest Weather Moments has run its course, the program it's displacing, Abrams & Bettes: Beyond the Forecast, will return to the schedule, and I will start leaving it on while making dinner. Possibly the sexiest show ever to receive a G rating, it seats its superfluously attractive hosts, Stephanie Abrams and Mike Bettes, in front of a U.S. map that glows in only entrancing shades of orange. Very often, they're telling you the temperature in Atlanta or dispensing their many multiple-choice quizzes—"What is Milwaukee's biggest April snowfall on record?"—above the electronic pulse of make-out music. The show rather feels as if they're on a first date: They can't think of anything to talk about but the weather, true, but they're both meteorologists, so they share a flushed excitement that suggests the night is going swell.

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Troy Patterson is Slate's television critic.

COMMENTS

Remarks from the Fray:

I want to be gentle about this, so I'll just say, "My mom and dad are getting on in years". Both parents are octogenarians on the high side of that designation. They lead active and remarkably productive lives of retirement. My mom is a real sweetie and I love her very much, except when it comes to the Weather Channel. To put it bluntly, she is a fanatic Weather Channel watcher. Like lots of old folks, since she takes an hour and a half nap each afternoon she has trouble sleeping through the night. A few years back, she discovered what a joy it was to have a personal relationship with the broadcasters on the late night weather channel. If you ever want to know the temp and humidity in Walla Walla at 3:15 in the morning (that's am, not pm), you can call her and she will happily share the last report with you.

To say she loves those guys is an understatement. She knows their names. She knows how and where they got into weather reporting. If the information has ever been made public, she knows their hometown, husband or wife's name, how many kids they have, what hair style they wore last year and how many sets on "On air" clothing they have. What I am trying to get across here is to convince you that she is a big fan of those folks and what they do.

We were at their house one weekend last year and in mid afternoon, my dad slipped away into a back bedroom while the rest of the clan remained in the den. Eventually someone asked where Dad was, and my mom said, "He is back there watching some old cowboy movie on TNT. I don't understand why he does that. They show the same movies over and over and he just watches them again and again."

I somehow managed to keep a straight face and refrained from making any comments in response to what Mom had said.

You, see, we had been watching the Weather Channel for over three hours of non-stop coverage of a line of thunderstorms moving slowly across Kansas.

--meridiantoo

(To reply, click here.)

(4/15)

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