This originally appeared in the 2019 Best of Louisville issue of Louisville Magazine.
A couple months ago, I was watching a meteorologist (not Tawana Andrew) who delivered a forecast like a grizzled safari guide schooling his reckless lot. There is DANGER out there. And you have a choice: Listen to my every word or risk your damn life. If you don’t have my app, get it. If you’re not one to pray, might want to start now. I’m barely exaggerating. Rain. It was raining. Such wildly intense moments of TV weather make me appreciate Tawana Andrew.
Andrew, who forecasts weekday mornings on WAVE-3, has a calm confidence. She knows her stuff. And she’ll tell you that stuff without a trace of hysteria. “Scaring people is not part of the job; informing people is. There’s no purpose in giving some little old lady a panic attack,” Andrew says with a laugh.
“Being on TV is one way I get to do what I love.”
Andrew was born in the Caribbean Islands and raised in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Hurricanes and severe storms left the now-25-year-old in awe of weather. At Florida State, she majored in meteorology and minored in math and physics. She had her sights set on a career in research, specifically studying tornadoes that form inside hurricanes. (Andrew’s scientific knowledge is evident on her weekly radio segment “Science Behind the Forecast,” which airs Friday mornings on WFPL.) She says she was “totally against” a broadcast career in college. Then, during her junior year, she took a weather-forecasting class. Something clicked. “I love the science behind everything,” she says. “And being on TV is one way I get to do what I love.”
This originally appeared in the 2019 Best of Louisville issue of Louisville Magazine. Read more.
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Photos by Jessica Ebelhar, jessicaebelhar.com
