In Louisiana, especially here in south Louisiana, meteorologists rockstars. When most of your year is plagued by the looming dread of a hurricane and the threat of flooding happens any time it rains, meteorologists are turned to and trusted above all. But now, meteorologists – along with many TV news personalities – are becoming social media stars. WVUE Fox 8 Hannah Gard is finding the sweet spot between the pressures of the job and letting viewers into her life through social media. Gard talks about the balance, plus a few insights on hurricane season.
Q: Why did you become a meteorologist?
When you talk to any meteorologists, every single person will say, “Well, I was like 4 or 5, and something happened.” And that’s exactly what happened with me. I mean, partially, before that. My dad is an engineer, so he’s a little bit of a science nerd. And he’s also a weather nerd. So if he could have another career, he would probably go back and be a meteorologist. He would tell me bedtime stories that were [about] the water cycle. He always had the Weather Channel on, and we were always watching storms. We would go out in them when we lived in Colorado when I grew up. People always don’t really think about Colorado as a big weather state, but there are all types of weather events there. We always had thunderstorms at my house, because we lived on the mountain and that’s where they fire up. Every single time, he would take me outside and we would sit in the garage with the door open on little camp chairs and watch it. That is the main reason, because my dad, but also [because] he had the Weather Channel on all the time. I was 5 when Hurricane Katrina happened. We were watching the Weather Channel, and they had probably Jim Cantori out there with his microphone with the wind hitting him. I looked at my mom and I was like, “I want to do that when I grow up.” I never forgot it, because it was such a big event. Obviously, people here know that, so it’s kind of ironic that I ended up here. My dad lived in Louisiana for a little bit. He lived in Baton Rouge. So we came to New Orleans all the time. That was one of the reasons he was watching it so closely. I never really thought about doing anything else after that.
Q: How did you get to New Orleans and Fox 8?
I would say it kind of started before I graduated. I was working while I was in school and because of COVID they needed help in Lawton, which is this very small town in Oklahoma. The TV station there only had two meteorologists at the time, so they had a job position open, and I applied for it. I ended up getting a lot of experience there because they only had two people. I ended up there for five or six months. After that, because I had that experience I got an internship with CNN over the summer. I worked with the weathering climate team. I wrote all of their web stories, and I was doing their digital…posting on Twitter and Facebook. And they offered me a freelancing position. Then Fox 8 just opened up and I thought it was a good opportunity. I was kind of trying to figure out where I wanted to go. I didn’t know if I wanted to do producing or if I wanted to be on air somewhere, but I kind of knew I liked doing local better because you get to forecast more, which is like kind of the nerdy fun part of our job. And then you kind of get a better connection to the people around you, the community…you get more connected to it. I ended up talking to David Bernard because he had seen my reel and he messaged me.
Q: Any insight into this year’s hurricane season?
You know, I always want to preface it with, it does not matter what the outlook is because there can be one storm that hits us, and that is the storm that matters. It doesn’t matter what the outlook is, you always have to prepare, regardless. This year, it does look like we have a lot of the conditions for an above-normal season. The Colorado State University outlook has been put out already, this was April 4. They are predicting an extremely active season. The reasoning [is] we have well above-normal sea surface temperatures right now. They’re what they should be in July, [and] we still have a ways to heat up still. And then we’re transitioning from El Nino, which is a very unconducive environment for storms to La Nina, which has lower wind shear across the Atlantic, which just means they’re not competing with as much once they get across the ocean. Those two things obviously, lead to a better environment for storms.
Q: Any tips you can share with readers ahead of the season?
It’s been so quiet for two years. I think the most important things to remember each year are to make sure you have the things prepared for if you leave. You have that “go bag.” You have your important documents, all of that together, and then have it prepared for if you end up staying – power sources, food, supplies, things like that. Have a plan in place for if you’re going to evacuate, or if you’re not going to evacuate, depending on what the situation is. It doesn’t take a hurricane to knock out the power for a week. We can see that with a tropical storm, [and] the flooding issues that we’ve been having, we can easily see flooding problems. Preparing for all of that in advance is important.
Q: Why do you think the audience connects so well to weather through social media?
I think something that people struggle with when you’re on TV is knowing you as a person, Obviously our primary job is trying to convey the weather to you, the science and explaining why things are going to happen. Sometimes your personality gets lost in that. I think that social media is a good place to show your personality, show who you are, and do some longer form content that maybe is helpful. I try to explain more thoroughly to people because we don’t have a ton of time to do that on TV. You still have to cover what the day is like today, because that’s what people want to know. But on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok, I can go more in depth about maybe the severe weather threat or a hurricane approaching the Caribbean, something like that. I can take more time to explain. When you see people on TV, you’re not really understanding who they are as a person. So when you do watch those “get ready with me” TikTok’s, or the day in my life, you kind of get a more inside glimpse of who they are. [It’s] more connected to what you’re doing with meteorology and getting the news out there to people, but it also humanizes it a little bit.
