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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowChuck Lofton was hired as a weather forecaster and anchor for WTHR Channel 13’s “Sunrise” morning show when it debuted in 1985. He since has survived any number of severe weather events, including tracking tornados, as well as the notoriously fickle TV news business.
But in March, he had a big health scare, followed by triple-bypass heart surgery and a two-month recovery off the air. At 65, he would seem to be a prime candidate for winding up his career and taking it easy. But in some ways, he is healthier now than he was five years ago, and he’s enjoying the work more as well. At one point he assumed that 65 would be the end of his career, but now his attitude is much more open-ended.
In this week’s edition of the IBJ Podcast, Lofton chats with host Mason King about his longevity in the TV news business; the offers he’s had—but not taken—to move up from the Indianapolis market; the close shaves he has experienced in the field; and whether there is room on local TV news to talk about the politically charged topic of climate change.
Click here to find the IBJ Podcast each Monday. You can also subscribe at iTunes, Google Play, Tune In, Spotify and anyplace you find podcasts.
You can also listen to these recent episodes:
IBJ Podcast: Former school board member gets streetwise as bus driver
IBJ Podcast: The audacious challenge of choosing leaders for the inaugural Indiana 250
IBJ Podcast: The state has $6.1B in reserves. What will lawmakers do with it?
IBJ Podcast: Pete the Planner says the best thing to do now is ‘stop spending money’
IBJ Podcast: What lies beneath downtown’s Diamond Chain site?
Looking for another podcast to try? Check out IBJ’s The Freedom Forum with Angela B. Freeman, a monthly discussion about diversity and inclusion in central Indiana’s business community.
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I stopped wasting my time with local TV news and weather many years ago. To that extent, I’m not very up to date on what local weather-casters have been recently saying. Yet the long-time failure of television weather reporters to adequately correlate and educate re the weather and looming man-made climate change is well recognized (and deplored). After so many years of media denial and dismissal, during which period carbon emissions have greatly increased, now we have an existential crisis. So it goes.
Chicken Little has spoken!