News & weather

[Joanna]

I have a question.  We have cable here in town.  Which station has the best coverage for Elk County? I usually only watch the 6 o'clock news and I don't worry about the weather unless I'm travelling or planning a bar-b-que , but the weather guy in the one I've been watching (KAKE) always stands so his elbow covers the area I want to see! I've been thinking of writing in to ask him to please take a half a step to his left.

Marty says that none of the stations "claim" Elk or Chataqua counties, so they don't have coverage unless something major happens here.  Is that the way you see it, or is there another channel with better coverage?  I know I could always watch the Weather Channel, or check it out on the internet, but thought I'd ask you guys first.

[indygal]

Hi Joanna!

The way I understand it is that southeast Kansas "belongs" to the Kansas City viewing area (like that makes any sense, but they didn't ask my opinion on it!) I'm pretty sure the cut-off points are Emporia south to Wellington, as they rarely report anything east of of those towns. When I lived in Chanute, the weather reports for SEK came from the KC news channel. I think there might be a station in Joplin, MO., as well that covers SEK. About the only time I hear weather-related news about the southeast part of the state on a Wichita station is when a tornado is headed in that direction and had to pass through one of the "viewing area" counties to get there!

I may be completely off base on this, but like you, it perturbs me that our "local" weather reports neglect to cover the entire state. And while we're discussing it, why is they will report on weather in McCook, Neb., but not a large part of Kansas? Again, I think it has to do with viewing areas.

[Wilma]

Channel 16 carries local conditions for Winfield and shows a radar and update on the 8s.  That is at 8 minutes after the hour, 18 minutes after the hour, 28 minutes after the hour, etc. most of the time.

Channel 99 is a continual KWCH weather channel and is pretty informative.

I watch the news first thing in the morning, from 6:00 to 7:00 and can flip from 12 to 10, to 3 and get a pretty good picture of the weather.  Same thing at 5 and 6 in the evening and 10:00 at night.  3 usually starts their weather first, then 10 and 12 about the same time.  If conditions are bad, all the channels keep an update going.  Channel 4 has news at 9:00.

 I agree with you that the weathermen stand in front of the area we are interested in.  Telling them about it might help, but their interest is in what is coming, not in what has passed them.

[Joanna]

Thanks! I've printed out the info you shared, at least until I've got it memorized, so I can keep it by the tv.  It should be easy to remember ~ 3, 10 & 12 were the ONLY tv stations we got when I was a kid and now that I'm headed into my second childhood... HA! HA! HA!  Just kidding, I'm not that far gone yet... at least I don't think so...   

[Wilma]

I finally remembered, Channel 12 has been covering bad conditions from Eureka by interviewing Teresa Gulick (nee;Ludvickson), supervisor of the state highway boys in Greenwood county.  She is also one of my other daughters, being Janet's best friend in high school and in and out of our house as if she lived there.  I loved it.