Website Tracks Accuracy Of Skilling's Weather Forecasts

By Chuck Sudo in News on May 2, 2013 6:10PM

The best meteorologists can be off on their weather forecasts, even Tom Skilling, whose weather forecasts dominate WGN newscasts and are often accepted as gospel by most Chicagoans. In fact, Chicagoist once charted a week of Skilling's forecasts to see if what he predicted would happen.

Cesar Ruelase started a website, How Wrong is Skilling, to keep track of the differences between Skillings weather forecasts and the actual temperatures. Ruelase claims that, since April 1, Skilling's forecasts have been off by a total of 287 degrees.

"By calling himself a Meteorologist, Tom Skilling has led us to believe he knows what the weather will be. In fact, he has no idea," Ruelase said. "He's just guessing and is usually wrong."

To be fair, predicting the weather entails more than just putting numbers for high and low temps and Ruelase told Chicagoist he hasn't compared Skilling's forecasts with those of Jerry Taft, Steve Baskerville and Brant Miller. (For what it's worth, Taft acquitted himself well in our 2007 comparisons.)

We recommend if Ruelase is so incensed by Skilling's forecast, change the channel. Or if you don't like the weather in Chicago, wait five minutes.