Veteran TV meteorologist Joe Cupo looked a little surprised last week when he entered the crowded room at OceanView in Falmouth.

“They told me there were only going to be 25-30 people,” he said, walking up to the podium.

Instead, it was standing room only; well over 100 people had amassed to hear the local celebrity speak about the job he’s held since 1979.

“This is the only area I’ve ever worked (at forecasting),” Cupo said. “I went to college in Albany (New York) and did some forecasting there, but that’s not that far from Portland. I’ve worked in the Northeast all my life. This is a challenging area of the country. Most forecasters love coming to New England.”

Cupo, 60, of Falmouth, fielded questions and discussed how his job has changed over the years.

I asked if living next to Sebago Lake affects my weather. “Absolutely.” he said, “The wind coming off the water is going to make a difference in your temperature and humidity. That’s a micro-scale situation; that’s a big lake.”

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Like me, perhaps others in the Lakes Region experienced the “Sebago Lake-effect” during the large, freak snowfall this past October. Living right next to the lake’s eastern shore in Raymond, I awoke to little more than an inch of snow that day. I was shocked when I heard Raymond received a foot of snow.

Cupo said he uses computer models to determine his forecasts, but that old-fashioned methods like weather balloons are still used. The National Weather Service in Gray launches these balloons every day. Models need data to produce a forecast and those numbers are gathered through these inflatables that can go 80,000 feet into the atmosphere, higher than jet planes.

“The models are nothing more than mathematical equations that tell us how the atmosphere is supposed to behave,” Cupo said. “I go to work every day and this information is waiting for me.”

These days, Cupo said we have access to the very same data he does via the Internet. Since it doesn’t come as a narrative, the trick is in knowing how to read it. Abbreviations are used so you have to learn what different letters and numbers represent. He explained how to read data printed directly from these websites. Some listed 60-hour predictions, while others went out to seven-day forecasts.

“Beyond day four, the probability is only about 50 percent,” Cupo said.

As any New Englander knows, the models aren’t always correct. Cupo said there are at least three models he can access: the United States, Canada and Europe each have a model. The Navy also has one.

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However, back in meteorology school, Cupo said it was drilled into him that “the model is guidance, it’s not gospel.” It’s up to individual forecasters to read through those models.

“Sometimes we have to go with our gut,” he said.

He pointed to one such date in history where things didn’t go exactly as projected.

“April 6, 1982,” he said. “Look it up if you get a chance. I went to work that day, and as I’m driving in, the sky looks pretty nasty. And it was cold, very cold. I got to work and looked at the satellite and saw a storm off to the East Coast. I said, ‘Oh my God, it’s going to snow.”‘

Cupo checked the models and precipitation was not indicated. The storm was supposed to go out to sea.

“I said to myself, ‘The model’s wrong. We’re going to get snow.”‘

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Cupo went on the air that night and communicated this in his nightly three-and-a-half minute forecast. Saying the models were wrong, he predicted 1 to 3 inches of snow.

“We got 16.9 inches,” he said.

Don Perkins is a freelance writer who lives in Raymond. He can be reached at:

presswriter@gmail.com

 


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