Tough crowd awaits most weather forecasts

About a decade ago, the newsroom of this paper was reminded of a valuable lesson.

Late one evening a veteran journalist wrote a front-page story for the next day’s paper, essentially stating as fact something that was almost certain to happen. The article opened, and we’re paraphrasing here: “By the time you read this, there should be close to a foot of snow on the ground.”

When North Idahoans read that the following morning, there wasn’t a foot of snow on the ground.

There wasn’t an inch.

There wasn’t a blasted snowflake.

The storm speeding our way with virtually a 100 percent chance of ravaging the region in a wintry assault decided to go elsewhere at the last minute. The Coeur d’Alene area was left high and dry. The Press was left with mud on its ink-stained face.

The lesson? Assume nothing when it comes to weather forecasts, especially when you’re producing newspapers 10 or more hours before most people will see them. Prepare for the worst, hope for the best but assume nothing. And for goodness sake, never state a prediction as fact. Mud eagerly awaits.

With that as background, we at The Press are certainly hoping, for our favorite climatologist’s sake, that when you woke up this morning, there was some snow on the ground. Cliff Harris, who has been predicting long-range weather patterns for many decades with an outstanding batting average, has not fared particularly well lately. The weather extremes that he and Press meteorologist Randy Mann harp on constantly have made their fickle power felt, snowing when it shouldn’t and drying when it should be wet.

With Christmas now two weeks away, Cliff has climbed out on a slippery limb. He’s sticking to his earlier prediction that Coeur d’Alene will enjoy a white Christmas. He’s given that a 95 percent likelihood of happening. Yes, 95 is pretty high. In fact, it’s almost a certainty.

No matter what happened overnight with a storm he predicted Monday morning would bring snow locally while other forecasters were betting on rain, Harris will be a hero if his white Christmas projection comes true. Maybe someone can create some public art in his honor at Riverstone.

And if all we got last night was rain? Like The Press a decade or so ago, he’ll have some mud on his face. But if you look closely, you’ll still see a smile underneath.