The Voice-Tribune

FALL 2013

The Voice is a glossy magazine offering exclusive access to Louisville’s social scene, fashion must-haves, the latest community news and local sports.

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weather and about halfway through it just hits me that even in this smaller market there are thousands at home watching me and I started to get nauseous – like really sick to my stomach," remembers Webb. He fought through the segment and upon rushing off the green screen found a bathroom. This may have been the first, but it definitely wouldn't be the last time he would experience this type of reaction. As the years went by and Webb's on-camera skills were refined, he was able to turn down job offers from all over the country, including opportunities with CNN International in Atlanta, all the way to California. During this time, the Bluegrass State finally made its way onto his radar and in 2008 once more, uprooted his family and found a new home at WHAS 11. From Seattle to Illinois, Korea to Oklahoma, back to Seattle and finally to Louisville, the weatherman's journey to chief meteorologist has been one based on a deep knowledge and artful intuition of what he coins an "imperfect science." "The weather, as we know is unpredictable and we do our best to collect the most data we possibly can but at the end of the day there is a great deal of art that goes into interpreting that data," states Webb. To read statistics off a screen can be learned. To hone in on one's intuition of what the past has taught us about certain weather patterns and to be able to anticipate the unexpected is an art. "Sometimes our art of forecasting can be a masterpiece, and other times not," he concludes. Little did he know at the time what an imperfect masterpiece he would eventually face when the perfect storm found its way into our backyard. It was this moment that once again feelings of nausea and a rush of emotions forced Webb to remove himself from the green screen once more in his career. "As I'm standing there in the safety of the news room, literally watching these peoples' lives being destroyed in an instant, I kept having these flashes of horrific scenes in the back of my mind – so much so that in the middle of the broadcast I had to step off the set and hand it over to Ben [Pine]." "Monty and I started around the same time in the spring of 2008 and we've been through a lot over the last five years," comments Ben Pine, WHAS 11 meteorologist and co-worker of Webb. "Hurricane Ike's wind storm of 2008, the ice storm in January 2009, the August 4th flood later that year, the record tornado season in early 2010, and then the Henryville event in March 2012 … just to name a few. It's great and really a necessity to have someone you FA L L 2 0 1 3 w w w. v o i c e - t r i b u n e . c o m | The Voice oF LouisviLLe 37

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