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How Are Weather Forecasts Made?
Gary Lezak • 2022-09-06
Dylan Carnahan:Welcome to the Simple Questions Podcast. This is your host, Dylan Carnahan. You're listening to Boysenberry by Jeff Shirley. Originally from outside Liberty, Missouri, Jeff started playing and developing his musical skills at seven years old. His specialties are composing, playing jazz guitar and teaching. In September of 2021, Jam Music Readers nominated Jeff as one of the top four favorite jazz guitarists in Kansas City. His band, the Jeff Shirley Organ Trio, is playing at the Green Lady Lounge late night every Monday and Thursday. He also plays with RSS Trio late night at the Green Lady Lounge every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. You can listen to Jeff's newest album, Blue Gold, on all streaming platforms and follow Jeff on Instagram and Twitter to stay up to date. The question for this episode is, how are weather forecasts made? You will learn in this episode about forecasting models, weather patterns, and the challenges of predicting weather in the Midwest. Our guest is a meteorologist with over 30 years of experience, appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show with her weather dog, Windy. They are a chief meteorologist at Kshb 41, founder of Weather2020 and the Lezak's recurring cycle, a scientific method of forecasting weather. I introduce to you Gary Lezak. Thank Go ahead and say, we have a KC Legend with us here. You've been in the weather game for a while, Gary, but let's go back to the beginning. What made you want to become a meteorologist?
Gary Lezak:Well, Dylan, thanks for having me on this podcast. It's great to be here, and I can't wait to answer some of your questions. I've always been interested in meteorology and weather. I mean, I was born in Southern California. A meteorologist wanted me way back when I was five years old. The first thing I can remember is looking outside and seeing clouds and going, Dad, Dad, Dad, what is that?
Dylan Carnahan:Look, look, look, look.
Gary Lezak:My dad go, what? It's a cloud. I go, I know, it's amazing, a cloud. But in Los Angeles, that was significant. Sometimes we'd go a long time without clouds and rain and it never snowed. But so ever since I was five years old, I've been interested in weather and grew up fascinated by it and 1978, when I was 16 years old, my mom and dad bought me the Star Wars calendar. That was when Star Wars came out in 1977, the first one, way before you were born. And in 1977, 1978, I got that calendar and I started keeping weather entries in there. And it was one of the most exciting years in Southern California's history for weather. And you could just see all my entries, it was amazing. But then I went to college, got the University of Oklahoma and got my degree in meteorology and boom, there you go.
Dylan Carnahan:That's, you know, fortunate for you at five years old, you already knew what you wanted to do.
Gary Lezak:I'm still five years old, I'm still a little kid.
Dylan Carnahan:Yeah, you gotta have that curiosity. Well, it's good that you caught on to that so young and you know, you found your passion. Now, after you go, you know, receive some education, you know, how does your career as a meteorologist begin?
Gary Lezak:Yeah, that's interesting. You have to get a few breaks. In my senior year at the University of Oklahoma, by meteorology, meteorology degrees are not easy to get at the good universities. So University of Oklahoma, University of Wisconsin, Florida State, Penn State, St. Louis University and a few others have big meteorology programs and they're heavily weighted in math. I just happen to be really good at math. And so it helped me go through college. And in 1985, I got my degree in meteorology. And that same year, a journalism student at the University of Oklahoma, I went to the professor six months before I graduated. And he said, hey, you got this class on Norman Cable TV. Do you think our meteorology students could come in and do the weather at this class? So the journalism teacher said, yes. This guy, his name is Brad Huffines. And Brad said, Gary, I'm doing it Tuesdays and Thursdays. And Tim is doing it Mondays. Why don't you do it on Wednesdays? Something like that. And I'm like, well, let me go ask my mom. I'll let you know. So I went home and I said, mom, and my mom was like, of course you want to do that. And my best friend's like, come on, of course you want to do that. So I'm like, okay. So the next Wednesday, next thing you know, I'm on Norman Cable TV, first time, it's a little tie on. And I was nervous, but I got so excited to do the weather. When I got up there to do the weather, I was just so excited, even though I was so nervous, you could tell. And then through that class, it sort of led to an internship at the CBS station in Oklahoma City. And then after a seven month internship there, somebody said a bad word on TV. And that's how I got my first job. I mean, you can tell you that whole story, but if you want me to, it's up to you.
Dylan Carnahan:But go for it, yeah.
Gary Lezak:Okay, I'll try to do it in two minutes or less. It was the day of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, January 28th, 1986. I was an intern at that station and at home, and I'm watching the Space Shuttle Challenger launched and blew up and seven people were killed. And it was devastating. That same morning, right before that happened, the meteorologists in the morning, we used to make our forecast. Nowadays, it's 725, 825 in the Cuddins, Lindsay Anderson's on KSHB and she does Cuddins, she says, good morning, and they're live. I mean, you're all this Lindsay Anderson, expect a beautiful day today. We used to have a picture of us with the forecast on there and we would record it. So this meteorologist in the morning, his name was Paul Bouchereau, went in there and he pushed the record button and he said, good morning, this is meteorologist Paul Bouchereau, it's a beautiful morning across the Apollo this morning, it's up the, it's a, ah, boom, he lands the F button, okay? He just, as loud as can be. And then he thought he was going to erase it, the audio guy says, hurry up, Paul, you're on in 30 seconds. So he thought he re-recorded it, he did not, it goes to on the air, on the CBS station there and says, here's what's happening to your neck of the woods and he comes on, good morning, this is meteorologist Paul Bouchereau, he goes across, boom, and he gets fired that morning. He was on thin ice anyway, they wanted a reason to fire the guy and they fired him. So I'm sitting there, I don't know this has happened, it's three hours later, I'm watching this facial challenge of disaster and here comes, I get a call from the chief meteorologist here in England, he says, Lozak, you call me Lozak, Lozak, you hear what happened to dad going on, oh no, this is horrible, this is disaster. He goes, no. Paul said, on the air, you got an interview of two. And I went in for my interview of two and they told me, Gary, you start tomorrow, no pay. I said, no pay? Can't you pay me the lowest pay scale you have? And I said, and he said, no, I need to know right now, take it or leave it. I said, I'll take it, okay? And so I started the next morning, they introduced me, that was my first time on broadcast television, January 29th, 1986, and the rest is history. That's my first big break, the day of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.
Dylan Carnahan:Wow, that is a flashbulb moment for multiple reasons. Wow, tough day for that guy too.
Gary Lezak:I know.
Dylan Carnahan:Great, great break for you, Lienio.
Gary Lezak:I know, he went into fails and never went back into meteorology again.
Dylan Carnahan:Darn technology back then. Could have helped him out. Wow, that is a fascinating story. Just to kick off your career. Now, I wanna go back a little bit to kind of lay a foundation for some of these later questions when we get into meteorology. And specifically when we talk about, you brought up math. What areas of science does a meteorologist have to know?
Gary Lezak:Well, like I said, all areas of science are important, but understanding math is the most important thing. So math, science topics, those are the things you need. If you know math and science and you're well educated, you can go on and get your meteorology degree. So math is really the biggest thing you need to know. There's so much math.
Dylan Carnahan:Yeah, no, I sherv it, sherv it. Now, this is a softball question here. All right. What is the job of a meteorologist? We've been talking about it this whole time, but what is it, you know, what are they doing?
Gary Lezak:You know, for broadcast meteorology, it's one thing. I've started a company called weather2020.com. We'll talk about it a little bit later. As I transition and retire on December 1st, I'm going to be doing full forest Weather2020, and my role as a meteorologist will change just a little bit, just a little bit. So the best part about December 2nd is that I will no longer have a boss, and I'll be my own boss, and I've got a company that is going global that's going to hopefully become highly successful using my theory. But right now, as a broadcast meteorologist, I'm up at about 7 every single morning, about 7.30. I'm doing a blog for KSHB. We write the blog, and then at 7.50 every morning, I'm on Sports Radio 810WHB, where I get to do two of my favorite things, sports and weather. And it's a running joke on that show, am I going to even do the weather? Well, it is a sports station, so why do I have to do the weather? But I do. It's just a running joke. And we end up doing the weather sometimes. And then at 8, 8.30, when I'm done with that, I go work out usually, and by 1 o'clock, I'm on my way to work. I get to KSHB at 1.30. We have a 4-hour news, a 5-hour news, a 6-hour news, a 6.30 news, and a 7-hour news. Most days, I'm doing the 5, the 6, the 6.30, and the 10. Sometimes, I'm doing the 4 as well when somebody's on vacation. But otherwise, one of the other guys usually does the 4, and then I do the 5. So I get there at 1.30 or 2. I analyze all the data. I make my forecast. We're also graphics artists. We're meteorologists that become graphics artists, because we have those maps you see on the air, the creative ones we make. And so we decide what we want to be in our weather show every day. We're sort of producing a weather show. And then we have three or four minutes. And I only want three and a half minutes. So I was told I want seven minutes, but I never get it. And then I'm on the news. And about 7.15, we get a dinner break. I could take an hour, maybe even an hour and a half on some days. Maybe a lot of days. Then I do the 10 o'clock news. I look at the new data, update the forecast. And that's my primary job every day.
Dylan Carnahan:Wow, I did not know that you made those graphics.
Gary Lezak:Yeah, we make the graphics. And then of course we have public appearances. When you're in a market like this one, I've been here for 30 years in Kansas City. You can imagine. I've been MC of the Furball for 20 years. I've been MC of Shave to Save Fundraiser. I hosted the Kansas State Pet Telethon for 20 years. I've been involved in dog and jog. So you get involved in these things that a lot of times impact your life and your weekends. You go to lots of schools and meet all these kids with my dogs, Rainbow and Sunny. It used to be windy and stormy and breezy. So yeah, it's quite a job. That's why December 1st, when I retire, that's going to suddenly end. But then I've got something bigger to share with the world.
Dylan Carnahan:How is your daily schedule going to be impacted once you make that transition?
Gary Lezak:It's going to be great. You're young and you're getting started, and I'm 60, and it sounds like I'm retiring, but I'll be working, but I'll be for the first time. If you look at my career, I was a morning meteorologist for 15 years, from 1985, 86 to 2000 or so, to 1999, when I became the Chief Meteorologist at KSHB, and then I was the evening meteorologist for the last 23 years. So 38-year career or primetime TV didn't exist for me, and thank goodness we have DVRs nowadays, back in the old days, you'd have to record it on VCR or whatever, but I would either be going to bed at 7 or 8 o'clock or I was at work at 7 or 8 o'clock. So I've had 38 years of my entire life where that's been like a difference. So I'm going to have a different life just for that. I'll get my workouts in. I'm all about eating healthy, working out, and then during the day I'll be running my business and making a global company out of what we're doing.
Dylan Carnahan:You have obviously dedicated a lot of your life, as you just mentioned, to meteorology. You're retiring, you're having your own business, dealing with weather. This is obviously very important to you, but how important is it to forecast the weather?
Gary Lezak:Well, forecasting the weather, I've always been a really good weather forecaster anyway. Probably because I was interested since I was five years old. It wasn't a storm that got me interested. Like a lot of meteorologists, they have a storm that impacted them when they were younger, and that caused their interest. For me, it's just in me. I made weather games when I was a kid. I literally would create my own little world. I think I've got some of those saved, where I had little areas that I'd make forecasts for up in my room. My mom would probably wonder, what is he talking about? I was doing the weather as a 10-year-old kid. And so I started practicing forecasting real early, and I got obsessed with Dr. George Fishbeck. You can look him up. He was a very famous meteorologist in Los Angeles, and originally from Albuquerque, New Mexico, but he was in LA, and he would show these upper level flow charts at about 500 millibar level. That's 18,000 feet up in the atmosphere. It's actually halfway through the atmosphere in weight. He would show that to show a storm coming into California. It got me so excited. I got obsessed with those maps, and that's probably how years later I discovered the LRC, my theory, my hypothesis. We'll talk about that in a minute. But to answer your question, forecasting the weather has four big elements to it. One, always look outside. Rule number one, always look outside, because you never know. What happens when a thunderstorm forms right over your head? I'm on the air, I'm inside, a thunderstorm is forming, and I'm like, hey, there may be a thunderstorm in three hours, and yet there's one forming on you now, so you don't want to get that wrong. So always look outside, and I do every time before I'm on TV, every night. Rule number two, look at radar, satellite information, see what's happening, see what's happened in the last few hours, see if there's anything that's showing a disturbance heading our way. Rule number three, look at the computer models that are usually wrong, but look at them to see what they're suggesting might happen. And then rule number four, make up your own mind. And this is the difference between what I've done and a lot of other meteorologists. They literally don't make up their own mind. The National Weather Service says this, the National Hurricane Center says that. And perfect example, the National Hurricane Center this year, all these meteorologists predicted a wild hurricane season. It's been a record quiet hurricane season. I was able to predict that using my theory of the LRC, a quiet hurricane season, and we just set a record. First time since 1941, there hasn't been a named storm from July 3rd to August 31st into the first week of September. But now something's forming as predicted. So anyway, those are my rules of forecasting. I think you can get me on a tangent. We'll get back to that later.
Dylan Carnahan:I want to go back. You name dropped some tools used to create a forecast. What are some of those tools?
Gary Lezak:Well, we have computer models. We have, of course, all the weather instruments. And nowadays, anybody who's interested in weather, you can get your own weather instrument, you can get your little weather computer if they're not that expensive and track the weather. And if you learn how to use the computer models at all, you can go make your own forecasts. And so a lot of people try to do that. So it's fun. It's a hobby. For me, you know, if I was literally retiring, I'll be happy spending eight hours a day just as a hobby during the weather. But I've turned my hobby into a career. So even when I'm an old man someday, if the sun was out of the window and I can see and hear it all, I'll probably be happy because I can just play with the weather. I play with the water every day.
Dylan Carnahan:That's the dream. Now, you've brought up a couple of times how you approach things is different than other meteorologists, specifically LRC. Can you explain a little bit more about that?
Gary Lezak:Yeah, as I said, Dr. George Fitzbeck used to show those 500 millibar charts, the flow in the atmosphere. In 1987, 1988, you can see this mural behind me. That is 1987, 1988's winter. Oklahoma City averages eight inches of snow a winter. So some years they might get 15 inches, and then some years they might get zero. That's how they ended with eight inches. Very rarely do they get major snowstorms there. Well, in 1987, 1988, in December, there was a one-foot snowstorm. A few weeks later, there was another one-foot snowstorm. What? Oklahoma City had a foot of snow and then another foot of snow a few weeks later? Not to mention other storms that winter. It was that winter when I looked at the pattern that created the first one-foot snowstorm. It looked like this. I looked at the pattern that created the second one-foot snowstorm, and it looked like that. Almost the same. That and that. It's like, wait a second, those patterns are similar. They almost look identical. That's when I realized that the pattern was cycling regularly. Now, fast-forward 15 years of studying later. In 2002, I had a very popular blog started at kshb.com, and the bloggers started watching me talk about it, and they named it the LRC for Lezak's Recurring Cycle. So the LRC is known around Kansas City as the weather pattern that's cycling, and it is cycling. And now you fast-forward 20 more years later, we have developed a system to predict hurricanes, winter storms, droughts, floods, just about everything. And I've got a model that's patent-pending that is a global model that can give you the forecast for the United Kingdom, for India, for Australia, for Brazil. We have customers in those places, all four of those. And the forecast 100 days out using the LRC is as accurate as the seven-day forecast on your app. Get your app, the seven-day forecast on there, and it's accurate on a certain level seven days out, but our 100-day forecasts are just as accurate because of the LRC. So we have a global model. It's accurate. And it's all because the river there above us is cycling regularly. It's fascinating.
Dylan Carnahan:Wow. That is incredible, especially, you know, you talk about 100 days out, the accuracy of that. Yeah. Now, explain that last part. So how is this cycle occurring? You know, I know you obviously spent a lot of time researching that, but I guess how, you know, how did you come that far? How did you come to the conclusion?
Gary Lezak:Well, just by watching it happen. I mean, experiencing it and observing. So I'm an artist, even though I'm a math, my mind is really a math-oriented mind. I'm somewhat of an artist. It's really odd because I don't really do mental movies with pictures like artists do. I'm really different. But it was just recognizing these patterns that are cycling over in Oregon. For example, this year happens to be about a nine-week cycle, 64 days. I'm not going to tell you exactly how I did find that out, but I've been trying to give it away for years. But it's a 64-day cycle. So Mayfield, Kentucky, got hit by a horrible tornado. All right? And it was December the 10th. And Mayfield, Kentucky has this horrible tornado. 56 people were killed. In this candle factory, nine people were killed. It was just destroyed. So when that happened, the pattern that produced Mayfield, Kentucky tornado and that tornado outbreak around that region, we now know that it's roughly a 63 or 64-day cycle, and around April 13th to 16th, the pattern is going to return during tornado season. And I wrote a blog, why this horrific tornado is a warning of things to come. And so on December 12th, we predicted that the part of the pattern that produced the horrific tornado would come back around April 13th or so. And on April 13th, thunderstorms were developing, the severe weather was setting up again, and I'm like, well, this will be interesting to see who gets hit. It's probably not going to be Mayfield again, will it? And Mayfield, Kentucky got hit again. This time, fortunately, just an EF1 tornado, so it only caused some damage and no deaths. So we predicted a tornado more than that, 128 days before, it was two cycles. Now that Sharon Springs, Kansas had a tornado on October 12th, Sharon Springs is like 10 blocks wide. It's a small little town in Western Kansas. One of the odds they get hit by a second tornado this year, 192 days, which is 64 times 3 after October 12th, is April 23rd, April 22nd, and they got hit by another tornado. So Sharon Springs, Kansas got hit twice. Mayfield, Kentucky got hit twice. It's an example of the pattern cycle regularly. If you get a tornado, it doesn't mean you're going to get hit again. The odds are low, there may be one close to you, but not in the same town, but it shows you that what I have here with the LRC, the predictability of even a tornado is possible that far out. And it's better for hurricanes and predicting winter storms, droughts, floods, everything around the entire world.
Dylan Carnahan:Wow, that is very useful. Let's dive into that a little bit more. So what are the benefits of being able to forecast something like that so far in advance?
Gary Lezak:There's one way I can tell you how lives can be saved, and lives will be saved someday using this technology, which is important. If you can save one life, it's important, right? So the duck boat accident that happened in tragedy in Table Rock Lake five years ago, I believe 2017 it was, maybe it was 2018, four years ago, something like that, but the duck boat accident, that thunderstorm on July, I believe 17th to 20th, somewhere in that range, 17th I believe it was, it was a 59-day cyclone. Every 59 days, Table Rock Lake got hit by a bad severe thunderstorm. If people were aware of the LRC, we can have a calendar, and when a thunderstorm was heading towards Table Rock Lake, the duck boat operators would say, oh, it's one of those LRC storms. It's not a normal summer thunderstorm. Let's not send out the duck boats, because we know what that means. And 17 lives would have been saved. If they don't send the duck boats out there because they know it's a different type of thunderstorm that would normally happen during the summer, I believe 17 lives would be saved. So that's one way. And there's many other ways. Predicting hurricanes, obviously, far in advance, has to help. Another way, businesses, let's say Walmart or Nordstrom or some kind of retail business, they know February 10th to 17th is going to be really cold. So maybe they don't put their bathing suits out and all their swimwear that they were going to do on February 10th. Maybe they should wait about 10 days. And instead of having all their summer, spring wardrobes going out February 10th because of the LRC, we know that week's going to be cold. Maybe they don't put as much of that stuff out there and they don't lose as much money. So that's another way. There's many different ways where the LRC is going to change the way companies make decisions. Companies are just now starting to use weather data. And there's one source of accurate weather data, and that's using my theory, the LRC.
Dylan Carnahan:Yeah, it's interesting just listing those two examples, especially the latter, the business aspect of how weather does forecast almost everything. Consumer preferences change just based upon weather, and that has serious benefits if you can forecast that out. Knowledge is power, and you can get ahead of that. Now, we've talked a little bit earlier prior to this about variability, right? You were kind of looking at two predictions there. What is the variability in your predictions using the LRC maybe compared to a typical forecast model?
Gary Lezak:Anything at 15 days out or farther, the LRC is the only way to know when and where something is going to happen. Forecasts in general, as soon as you get to one day out, the models have errors in them, and they compound in each other. Sometimes the models can be accurate seven days out, and using the LRC, we can tell if that model is right or wrong. But if it's showing a snowstorm in seven days, and we say, hey, next Saturday, there's a chance of a snowstorm, and it ends up being Sunday, that's still accurate, so it's a day off. But it's still extremely difficult to forecast the weather. How much snow is going to fall is probably the hardest thing to predict, because you can't get the exact number for every single location, and we don't have to do that with rain. With rain, if we say, hey, it's going to rain tomorrow, anywhere from a tenth of an inch to about an inch of rain may fall. And then if it rains, everyone's like, oh, they were right. But if you say the same thing for snow, it's usually a 10 to 1 ratio. So a tenth of an inch to one inch of rain would be like saying, one to 10 inches of snow possible. People go, oh, what are you talking about? You don't know what to do. One to 10 inches of snow. Anybody can do that. I'm like, no, watch what happens. And then the next day, one to 10 inches falls. It was one inch over here, it was 10 inches over there. And you know, it's hard to get the exact number. With rain, in range, you're right. With snow, it could be snowing like crazy. And you predicted five inches and only two inches falls. People are like, you blew it. I'm like, did we really? It's snowing.
Dylan Carnahan:Now, yeah, you bring up a good point, you know, on those other forecast models, right? You know, if you're off that day one, you know, day seven, how far off is that going to be? What are some, you know, ways that meteorologists, I guess, get out in front of that forecast altering as the days progress?
Gary Lezak:Well, you know, every, I always say in my statement, and if you watch me on TV a lot, you know, I go, new data, the new data is coming in, new data. Every hour, new data is coming in. So I think that you can make adjustments from hour to hour. And especially when there's a snowstorm coming in, you do want to watch at 10 o'clock. A lot of times these schools cancel at 5 and 6 o'clock news and the National Earth Service, we have a winter storm watch for 25 inches of snow in the morning. So all the schools are already canceled. Then I get new data in at 10, I'm like, uh-oh, the storm is going to miss us. And it's too late, schools cancel. So in the morning, if a storm misses you and schools cancel and it's not even snowing, that is not good. Now my entire career, that's only happened like once or twice maybe. In fact, one of those times was the day I left Channel 4 and came to Channel 41. I was off for six months in between. It was the greatest six months of my career, by the way, because I had six months off. It was fantastic and I got paid. But anyway, the 7th of 31st was my last day at Channel 4. And there was a winter storm coming in and we were predicting a big storm. And in the morning, the morning show, my second to last show, I said, hey, it looks like it might miss us. I'm not sure yet, but we'll let you know, but it might miss us. So I was right because it missed us, okay? At noon, my last show in the air, when I'm crying, because I've been on the air for seven years there, I don't know what's going to happen. These are the first, I better not cry, but it'll be a 30-year career, so we'll see. But I'm on the air, it's my last show, and the new data came out, it looked like we were going to get a hit. So I'm like, hey, now it looks like we're going to get a hit by the snowstorm. And by evening, oh, every source said it's going to snow. And then the next morning, my first day off, okay, January 1st, New Year's Day, I could see at five in the morning, it's missing us. And I started, I called my friend at the national weather service, I said, it's missing us, it's forming to our east, we're going to hardly get anything. We got like a half inch of snow when we predicted like six to 12 inches. So it was a complete bust, only one or two times that has ever happened in my career. But that can happen and that can be impacting, but that didn't have school closing because it was January 1st.
Dylan Carnahan:Well, that's good. Yeah, that's another thing, right? You know, based upon your predictions, you can cause people not to go out to school, right? Maybe I'm not going to go. Maybe I work virtually these days. There's impacts there. Now, you know, we talk to you bring up snowfall being something that's kind of difficult to predict. What are some other weather events that impose a difficulty?
Gary Lezak:Tornadoes. I mean, the most intense thing we do is predicting the chance of tornadoes and using the LRC. The Linwood, Kansas tornado, the last big one we had in our area was an EF4 tornado that blasted Linwood. No one was killed. We gave them 30 minutes warning, which was great. But those aren't challenging because, number one, trying to predict the severe weather. That one is developing, and that one, you know there's a tornado on the ground like that day. And that's only happened a few times in my career, maybe four times in my whole career. It shows you how rare it is here to have a tornado that we know is large coming our way. May 28th in 2019, I believe, was that day. And then May 4th, 2003, was the big tornado that crossed the Kansas Speedway area and the legends that was being built at that time. And it crossed over into Kansas City, Kansas, to Gladstone and Liberty, killed one or two people. But those are challenging because I know they're on the ground. I know people are in the path. And it's hard to hold in our emotions because we know that people might die. And we need to be calm. And if you watch closely, it is an emotional experience. And I have got the experience that I've been out there, so I just know. But those are very challenging days when you know what tornado is hitting and striking. And so fortunately, they don't happen too often. So that's one of those things, snowstorms, tornadoes. And then for the LRC and Weather2020, my company, we make a prediction for this quiet hurricane season. The problem with making a long-range prediction in March or even December is when we really made it for a quiet hurricane season. I can tell you how we did it, but you have to wait for the whole season before you're right or wrong. So it's like people can say so much for that forecast, and I'm like, just wait. And now we are going through September. Yeah, hurricane season is starting to act up. We have a couple of named storms developing, but it's still been quiet. It was a record quiet period, and my prediction is going to be right, but you have to wait a long time to be able to... I don't want to boast that we were right. I want to showcase that the LRC helped us predict this hurricane season, and that's why businesses need us, and we can save lives. By being successful at that, we'll get people's attention.
Dylan Carnahan:How do you handle... You bring up just there, people maybe have a dissenting opinion about something, and you're saying, hey, give it more time, or, well, you said it's from 2 to 10 inches. What the heck, Gary? Or the tornado, right? You know, this is a very serious affair. How do you handle that criticism?
Gary Lezak:There's a lot of criticism, and I've learned, I'm pretty good now at this point in my career, but I get affected. I've come on the year before when we're interrupting somebody's program at 8 p.m., the finale of This Is Us is on, or something like that. And all of a sudden, I come on, it's the finale. I just ruined the finale, but there's a tornado warning. So I have to say sometimes, hey, listen, there's a tornado warning. I know it's not heading toward Juneau or the park, but look at those of us here in Richmond to Chillicothe. They're in the path of this thing, and we're gonna cover it. There might be a tornado in that area, and we're just gonna be on tonight. You can miss your program this one time. Tomorrow I won't be on, and no, I do not want to be on right now. So some people will criticize, look at how happy he is. He's so excited to be on TV to ruin this program. No, the last thing I wanna do is interrupt that program. Believe me, and I've always been that way. And so, but those are challenging days. In Kansas City, we have to enter a program for tornado situations maybe at the most 10 days a year. At the most, usually only five. So let's say it's 10 days a year. That's 355 days where we don't cut into your program.
Dylan Carnahan:It's a plus. Flip how you look at it. Now, in your upbringing, you talk about the weather in California. That would be a little easier to predict than say the Midwest. What makes KC weather difficult to forecast? I know that's something that a lot of people always... It's a topic of conversation, right?
Gary Lezak:Yeah, it's tough. Kansas City is tough. The biggest reasons are where we are geographically located. We're due north of the Gulf of Mexico, so the humidity gets here from the Gulf of Mexico. We're east of the Rocky Mountains. The air will come in from the Pacific dry out, go over the Rocky Mountains, then come back down. And then those air masses clash over Kansas, Oklahoma, and Nebraska. We call it tornado alveoli, although it's been quiet for a few years for various reasons. The LRC is the reason for that, too. But they clash right here. So in Kansas City, let's look at Kansas City and let's look at St. Louis, okay? In Kansas City, it's clear blue sky. And a thunderstorm is going to form or not. Here comes the front, and it hits the moisture at Topeka, and these thunderstorms form. So, hey, thunderstorms are probably going to form around 2 o'clock, 3 o'clock, maybe 4, and then they'll be here by about 6. But they form at noon, so it's two hours early, and all of a sudden, here they are, okay? So in St. Louis, they go, hey, well, thunderstorms later, but they can see them forming in Kansas. And then they go, there they are, and then they can just time something that's already formed. We're timing something that's not even there yet. That is the biggest reason why Kansas City is one of the most difficult places in the world to predict the weather. And then in the winter, in Iowa, in Nebraska, it's going to snow, okay? It's cold enough to snow. And to our south, it's going to rain. And we happen to be near the rain snow line. Just also, where we're located, those rain, snow, sleet, freezing rain lines are often white near Kansas and Missouri. In Nebraska and Iowa, it's almost always cold enough to snow. In Oklahoma, it rarely ever snows except for that year. And a couple others. But we just are in the middle. So geographically, where we're located, it makes it extremely difficult to forecast the weather.
Dylan Carnahan:Well, that's fortunate. It's more unfortunate.
Gary Lezak:Yeah, it's been my whole career in the most difficult place to forecast the weather.
Dylan Carnahan:Yeah, you must like a challenge then. Are there other places in the world that have geographic features that make them difficult to forecast for?
Gary Lezak:Probably not like the plains. I'm sure there are. There's other challenging places to forecast the weather. Absolutely. It's hard to forecast the weather anywhere, really, but we're predicting the future. But because of the Rocky Mountains and the Gulf of Mexico, the plains are one of the most difficult places, if not the most.
Dylan Carnahan:Understood. I want to go back earlier to talk about this. How many days and hours can you forecast in advance? I know you talked about the LRC out 100 days. What is a typical weather forecast model? What does that look like?
Gary Lezak:For other forecasters that are not using the LRC, the limit is 10 to 15 days. And the accuracy of 10 to 15 days is sacrificed. The going statement from the National Hurricane Center will tell you that you can't predict a hurricane more than 10 days in advance. And yet, using the LRC, we predicted Hurricane Michael, Harvey, Troubled Storm Gordon, and last year Ida, and we reverse engineered Katrina from way back in 2005. You can predict these things 100, 200 days in advance using the LRC. So if you have the technology I'm bringing to the market and to the world, the accuracy at 100 days out and in January at 200 days out is as accurate as that 7 to 10 day forecast that most people think is a limit. That's the technology I'm bringing. So yeah, one example, one more example. The Chiefs are playing the Indianapolis Colts in a playoff game, and a foot of snow fell that day about 10 inches at the stadium. It was crazy out of tailgating. It just was glorious for the game, thank goodness. But two weeks before that storm, we had had a blizzard 47 days before that storm, okay? And it was a 47 to 48 day cycle that year. And so when we had the blizzard in November, and then we found out the Chiefs are getting the buy, and they're going to be hosting the first game of the playoffs, I knew, and so I'm on the air, hey, that is the blizzard part of the pattern cycling back through the snow. And the forecast by the models said sunny and 50. Seven days out, the models are still saying sunny and 50. But I know the models are wrong. So I'm saying, hey, on the air, the blizzard part of the pattern is cycling through. Five days before, four days before, finally, the National Weather Service chance of rain or snow. Three days before snow, two days before snow likely. And our forecast from weeks out ended up verifying and it put a snowfall that day. So there is a predictability far in advance using the LRC.
Dylan Carnahan:Wow, that's really interesting stuff. Now, you know, where can people learn more about you and Weather2020?
Gary Lezak:weather2020.com. It's like 2020 vision. We can see the weather patterns. And it's not perfect. We still can't see over here, but it's close. But weather2020.com. And I have a Substack account. You can go to weather2020.substack.com. And that will, or it might be Substack. I think that's what it is. Or the other way around. But either way, weather2020.substack.com. And you can join for free, or farmers have joined $300 for the entire year. And I give my LRC insights on there. And a lot of my customers are in North Dakota, because we were on a podcast up there, and we got the forecast right two winters in a row. And the farmers up there are like, why isn't anybody else using the LRC? I'm like, keep spreading the word.
Dylan Carnahan:Fantastic job, Gary. We've given a lot of people a lot of topics they can use for small talk. I look forward to seeing your next part of your career and seeing how that technology can help others. Thank you for coming on today. Bye That wraps up our conversation with Gary. We talked about how it can be difficult to forecast snow, how quickly weather forecasts can become inaccurate, and the benefits of using Lezak's recurring cycle. Follow Gary on social media to see all of his great content. Check out Weather2020 and their weather blog by going to weather2020.com. Do not forget to listen to Jeff Shirley on Apple Music or Spotify. You can also catch him performing frequently at the Green Lady Lounge. And lastly, subscribe to the Simple Questions Podcast to get notified when our latest episodes are released. Thank you for listening, and remember to keep asking questions.