TV

Watching all the local stations fall all over themselves to find new and exciting ways of reporting the same thing for more than two hours gives you time to think -- mostly about why it's the same thing every time all those multi-million-dollar radar systems the stations have invested in start going all pink and purple.

Given the number of screen crawls and "bugs" and other intermediate options that networks have at their disposal and regularly employ to hype upcoming episodes and special events and that we as viewers have to wade through/look around/watch over, why can't the stations use those same spproaches with weather events? Run a screen crawl giving current information and warnings; have a color radar map in the corner of the screen showing the storm front's progress, all the while continuing with scheduled programming. And break in only when there's is actually new and urgent news to report.

Instead, we get quadrophonic, wall-to-wall severe-weather coverage with meteorologists standing in studios and field reporters blinking into the downpour and clutching umbrellas, all to tell us what we already know -- that it's raining.

Of course, that's an easy position to take the day after when the sun is shining and no tornadoes tore up a suburb the night before. And granted, we were treated to lots of dramatic footage of battered car lots and lawns blanketed with hail and fallen leaves. But what in the live-and-don't-learn is going on here? It's spring in Texas. That means jumbo-tron thunderstorms. We get that. But do we have to go all Chicken Little every single time and pre-empt Lost (granted, repeat episodes, but still, two back-to-back) and The Office (another new one) to report that at some point in the next couple of hours, the sky may indeed be falling?

Two words and a cliche answer that question. The two words are "public trust" and the cliche is hindsight is 20-20. KXAS-TV's program director Brian Hocker was ready to talk about what decisions were made and why on Thursday night, since that was something folks at the local stations have to do every time the pre-empt regularly scheduled programming.

"It doesn't matter why, whether it's a state of the union speech or severe weather," Mr. Hocker says. "We're going to get calls the next day from unhappy viewers."

And yet, knowing those calls would be coming, especially when it's NBC's big Thursday night comedies line-up, the station still decides to go the wall-to-wall, hey-it's-really-raining approach. Why?

"As a traditional, over-the-air broadcaster, we've got a strong commitment to the community to report when there is a potentially life-threatening situation."

And there it is -- "potentially." Of course, today we all know that no tornadoes touched down, no one was swept away. But last night was a different story, which brings us to another cliche: "better safe than sorry."

"We've got three degreed meteorologists here who are qualified to make the tough calls. That's why we hired them," he says. "And, you know, God forbid you go off the air with your weather report and something happens and someone dies. Dallas-Fort Worth is a big market, covering 30 counties. You have to watch out for all your viewers."

So as irksome as it may be for viewers, when a storm is blowing in and the radar's going all pink and purple, what would you do -- go wall-to-wall or or take a chance? This may be one scenario when it is better to be proven wrong than right.

And as Mr. Hocker points out, with the upcoming switch to digital broadcasting, this will all soon be a moot point. Local stations will simply be able to report on the weather on one digital signal and continue with their primetime programming on another and viewers can choose which they watch.

Even now, technology is helping to ease the pain. Viewers can catch up on missed episodes by watching them on the networks' Web sites. WFAA-TV went ahead and re-broadcast the season finale of the buzz-buzz new drama, Eli Stone, at 3:10 am Friday morning, just as KTVT Channel 11 re-broadcast Survivor immediately after The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. WFAA will not be re-broadcasting the two Lost episodes that were pre-empted since they were repeats (but again, you can watch them on www.ABC.com). KXAS-TV, meanwhile, is re-broadcasting the new episodes of the three NBC comedies that were pre-empted. All three will be on early Saturday morning:
My Name is Earl from 2:04 to 2:34AM , 30 Rock from 2:34 to 3:04AM and The Office from 3:04 to 3:34AM (likewise, they are available on www.nbc.com or www.hulu.com).