Charlotte has a weather radar problem

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:00]I will say uh and I want to welcome in everyone who's new to this uh to this show.

[00:00:06]Um we got quite the Twitter conversation going starting on Friday night as race fans all weekend long were looking at their phones, Frank, and looking at the sky, maybe looking at the TV, and they were like, "What's the deal with this rain? It's raining. There's nothing on radar." Or it's barely showing up on radar. And uh I want to welcome to the fold who has just joined the saga on Charlotte does not have a full-fledged Doppler radar.

[00:00:39]And uh because we had I did a whole tweet thread on it.

[00:00:43]And um it might be my most popular post on X ever. Um but what was compounding issues is that even the terminal Doppler radar was offline. So, you have this >> No, no, the terminal Doppler radar does a perfectly adequate job.

[00:01:00]>> Yeah.

[00:01:00]>> Filling that gap. It does so it's it's exactly perfectly >> Sarcasm alert.

[00:01:06]>> [laughter] >> Referring to a past episode, too.

[00:01:09]>> Oh.

[00:01:11]>> Alluding to a certain past episode.

[00:01:14]>> [laughter] >> Yeah, anyway, so the radar beam from the 88D is uh over 5,000 ft, 6,000 ft. And so, a lot of the rain, no pun intended, was happening under the radar, right?

[00:01:31]So, like when a minute >> No, no, James, with with the updated software, the the updated setup for the 88D, it has a 0.2° tilt that beam's only 4,800 ft off the ground, man. It's perfect. Just when you combine that with the TDWR, you've got it you've got you're just fine. Mind you, can I remind you that Skycam footage of that severe thunderstorm I showed you today? That camera's 1,500 ft above the [laughter] ground, and we were in it, okay? So, and that's closer to GSB.

[00:01:56]>> [laughter] >> Um >> Oh, Frank, why are you doing this to me?

[00:02:01]You're like, Frank, you're like, Gibbs, [laughter] here's your soapbox, just climb on it. Just go for it. It's right there.

[00:02:06]>> See, now we have people like Brad Panovich yelling at the screen.

[00:02:09]>> Yeah, well, no, he's but I DON'T THINK HE'S >> JERK, STOP IT.

[00:02:12]>> I DON'T THINK HE'S YELLING at us. HE'S YELLING WITH SARCASM.

[00:02:14]I don't think he's yelling at us. He's yelling with us. Anyway, so you know, like a military jet will fly below the radar. They came in under the radar, right? So they couldn't be seen. The rain was doing the same thing. The radar being was so high uh that yes, rain was showing up on radar.

[00:02:32]But there was times where the intensity wasn't showing up or the amount of rain wasn't showing up or some of the rain wasn't showing up at all. So anyway, yeah, the three little head race fans were like, it's raining here.

[00:02:41]Um you know where I was you know where I was screaming at the TV? Is um when the Fox Sports people, who are very good at sports, but not very good at weather, were trying to explain what the weather conditions were at the track. And I just kind of wanted to be like, you have a Fox Weather app >> I've watched situations like that before and that's what I mean.

[00:03:04]>> just call in the meteorologist.

[00:03:06]>> I was like >> I mean, they don't have me doing color commentary for the Panthers, for crying out loud.

[00:03:10]>> Right. You wouldn't want me to do that, either. [laughter] So.

[00:03:13]Um Jay says, it's hard to believe that we're the 14th largest nationwide city and we ain't got no radar to cover us.

[00:03:22]Well, other than overlapping radars.

[00:03:23]Yeah, I mean, like I like that they overlap. You get redundancy of ones down, but the problem is, especially in that area, I mean, what did I I referenced it. The Harrisburg tornado of Oh, what year was it?

[00:03:36]You know, the tornado that didn't get warned and sucked two kids out of their bedroom and they were fine.

[00:03:42]>> 2012.

[00:03:43]>> time ago, right?

[00:03:44]What, 2012 is a long time ago?

[00:03:46]>> Yeah, something like that.

[00:03:47]>> Yeah, I guess it was. Anyway.

[00:03:51]>> [snorts]