5Viewer 1 Posted December 9, 2007 Share Posted December 9, 2007 I saw this story on CLTV a week ago and I thought it was interesting. I think Rosen just wants money from Gray, even though it looks like he has a good amount of money and weather experts can't get the data right all the time because they "forecast" the data, they aren't sure what is going to happen, or the weather might change. ORLANDO, Fla. -- Central Florida's most famous hotel owner, Harris Rosen, lashed out at hurricane expert Dr. William Gray for his gloomy storm predictions saying they have damaged state tourism. Rosen said he believes Florida lost billions of dollars in business because of Gray's outlook and even threatened a lawsuit. "Look, doctor, you've made these forecasts and you were wrong once," Rosen said. "You made the forecast and you were wrong twice. Are you going to continue to make these forecasts?" The hotel mogul said surveys show 70 percent of guests not returning to his hotels cited hurricane fears as the reason why. "I suspect it costs the state billions of dollars," Rosen said. "Five thousand people scheduled to attend my association meeting and I'm looking at Orlando and it is September or October, I may say, 'Why take a chance.'" Rosen said if people would stop paying attention to Gray, more people would come to Central Florida, Local 6's Chris Trenkmann said. Other business owners are angry at Gray's predictions. John Smith, who runs Storm Stoppers, a plywood alternative company that has benefited from busy storm seasons, spends thousand of dollars when an active year is predicted. "What we do is stock up," Smith said. "When there is a let down, we have all of our capital invested in materials and you know, we have to wait until the next big weather event." More and more business owners said they prefer that prognosticators keep their outlooks to themselves. "A local meteorologist would not last as long as some of these prediction artists have been in business," Smith said. Gray responded to Rosen's complaint, saying anytime there is a catastrophic hurricane season like in 2004, there will be a slowing down or hesitancy to return to Florida, Trenkmann reported. Gray, of Colorado State University, predicted 17 named storms with nine becoming hurricanes. The 2007 storm count came short of Gray's predicted totals and no hurricanes came near Florida in 2007. The last time Central Floridians dealt with a major hurricane was in 2004. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cjiniowa 2 Posted December 10, 2007 Share Posted December 10, 2007 You can't go to Florida because this guy says there might be hurricanes. So on your way to your New York (your alternate destination), your plane falls out of the sky. I suppose that the hurricane expert is responsible for that as well? After all, if the hurricane expert hadn't predicted hurricanes for Florida, you wouldn't have been on that airplane to New York... The world is full of uncertainties, and of people who just aren't willing or able to think for themselves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ib-td 1 Posted December 10, 2007 Share Posted December 10, 2007 You can't go to Florida because this guy says there might be hurricanes. So on your way to your New York (your alternate destination), your plane falls out of the sky. I suppose that the hurricane expert is responsible for that as well? After all, if the hurricane expert hadn't predicted hurricanes for Florida, you wouldn't have been on that airplane to New York... The world is full of uncertainties, and of people who just aren't willing or able to think for themselves. This prediction brings several points to mind-- 1) no one in FL gives any attention to a blue haired snow monger telling them how many storms there will be - except the media because they have nothing else to tell and they need to fill too many hours of "news" 2) His over-all avg over the time he has been predicting is very good, but that means nothing in reality 3) it takes one storm to wipe you out - regardless of what he predicts 4) people who place too much credence in this forecast system need to have a cat scan 5) seems to remind me of the so called psychics which predict various crap of the stars - same thing here why would anyone change what they plan based on a prediction? The church has said "Jesus is returning, turn or burn" for centuries. Has anyone changed what they did because of it? If so, maybe that person should check the scan appointment book as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoffrey 779 Posted December 23, 2007 Share Posted December 23, 2007 I don't think it's the forecast of hurricanes that scares people... it's the fact that hurricanes have happened before and continue to happen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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