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We took tons of calls tonight from viewers who were upset with us for interrupting House. Tons of calls, and many more went unanswered. We aboslutely understand your concern. Many of us at FOX 4 like House too, and a lot of us working in the newsroom tonight were hoping to watch it at home on our VCRs, DVRs and Tivos after work.

But please understand our first concern at FOX 4 is your safety. When the National Weather Service issued a Tornado Warning for southeastern Tarrant County, about 8:15pm, we had to go on the air right away to tell those people about the imminent danger. Tornado sirens were sounding in Arlington, and later Grand Prairie. Spotters were seeing low-level rotation in the clouds overhead. This was a very dangerous situation.

Folks asked us why don't we just give the warning, and then return to regular programming. Most of the time we do that. We try to keep our "cutin's" as brief as we can. But when there's an imminent tornado threat, we're going to stay on the air as long as public safety is at immediate risk. And there was a tornado-capable storm passing over about 200,000 people. And with nearby storms dropping golf-ball and even baseball-sized hail stones (confirmed by trained spotters), that's a life-threatening situation too.

All during our coverage, we were in close touch with the National Weather Service and with the ham-radio operators spotting the skies around the storm. As soon as the storm threat passed, we wrapped up. (Keep in mind there was another storm with a hail threat emerging in Hood and Bosque counties at the end of the 8pm hour.)

So far there's been no reports of wind or tornado damage, and no tornado was ever spotted in the Arlington area, despite the persistent low-level rotation. But as we learned from the Wylie tornado the other night, tornadoes can spin up with no warning. And they can cause significant damage. And they can hurt or kill people.

We don't like making viewers angry at us. But our first priority is keeping you safe. To those callers I spoke with tonight, and to all the rest of you who are upset with us, all I can say is that we'll do our best to provide the same level of warning when a storm like this comes to your neighborhood. And it will, one of these days.

Thanks for sharing your concerns and complaints, and thanks for reading our reply here.

The Other Chip

Interrupting "House" for severe weather coverage

ChipMahaney_FOX4

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