John Farley

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Chief Meteorologist

 

John Farley has worked as a Meteorologist for more than 20 years and is honored to be the Chief Meteorologist for ABC Columbia. He understands the challenges of forecasting the ever-changing weather of the Midlands. That was never more important than on Saturday night October 3rd, when the worst storm of a generation dropped up to 21 inches of rain right here in Columbia. During that storm, John spent the night and following day in continuous coverage, warning viewers of the perils of the flooding. He says, “It’s a period of 36 hours that has left an indelible imprint on me. Seeing our neighbors, whose lives are now changed forever because of the power of this storm, is very impacting.”

Before joining ABC Columbia, he was the Chief Meteorologist for NBC Affiliate in Columbia for 5 years. Prior to that he was at KNTV, the NBC affiliate in San Francisco, where he was the Chief Meteorologist for 9 years. John is an EMMY Award winning meteorologist, and is a Certified Broadcast Meteorologist (CBM) with the American Meteorological Society. He holds a Master of Science Degree in Meteorology from San Jose State University, in San Jose, California, where he received the honor of Graduate of the Last Decade from the College of Science in 2001.

While in Graduate School, John worked with a team to create mathematical models that forecast the fog at San Francisco International Airport. His team was given the Excellence in Aviation Award from the FAA in 2002. John Farley is happy to report that the FAA still uses those models today. While in California, John also worked as a consultant for a power company which provides gas & electricity to roughly 16 million people. His responsibilities included temperature, wind, snow, and severe weather forecasting, as well as providing long-term electricity generation forecasts for proposed wind farms.

John loves to talk weather and he has visited with thousands of students over the past 20 years. He lives in Lexington with his wife and three children. They are all thrilled to call the Midlands home.

John Farley

Articles

U.S. Drought Level Breaks Record

@DroughtCenter keeps track of how dry things are across the United States. Here's their tweet.   The extent of #drought (D1-D4) across the Lower 48 may have contracted a little this week, but the extent of drought AND abnormally dry conditions…

Election Day Eclipse

This coming Tuesday, Election Day, we'll be treated to a lunar eclipse.  That's when the earth casts its shadow on the full moon.  If you want to see the eclipse, you'll need to get up before sunrise.  For us, the…

Tropics: 2 Storms in the Atlantic

There are two active storms in the Atlantic Basin right now.  Hurricane Martin is well out to sea and will continue to move off to the northeast.  It will likely impact parts of Great Brittan, as a much weaker storm,…

New Tropical Storm, Lisa

A new tropical storm has formed in the Caribbean.  Lisa is well south of Cuba, has winds of 45 mph and is moving to the west at roughly 12 mph.  On this track, it's expected to make landfall in Central…

Offshore Wind Farm to be Largest Power Plant in History

A huge offshore windfarm is being constructed off the coast of China.  It will produce more energy than all the power plants in Norway combined.   Put another way, it'll produce 21 times the amount of electricity that the Hoover Dam…