Local on the 8s

Local on the 8s
Also known as	Local Forecast (1982–1996, 1998–2002)
Created by	The Weather Channel
Based on	Weather forecast
Narrated by	Dan Chandler (1987–1995 Weather Star 4000 systems only) Allen Jackson (2000–2015; IntelliStar and Weather Star XL systems only) Jim Cantore (2010–present; IntelliStar 2 systems only)
Composer	Various
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
Production
Running time	Varied between 30 seconds and 5 minutes, depending on the flavor (1982–1998) 1-2 minutes (1998-2013) 1 minute and 5 seconds (2013–present)
Release
Original network	The Weather Channel
Original release	May 2, 1982 (1982-05-02) – present

Local on the 8s (also known as the Local Forecast, LOT8s, or LF) is a program segment that airs on The Weather Channel. It provides viewers with information on current and forecasted weather conditions for their respective area; a version of this segment is also available on the channel's national satellite feed that features forecasts for each region of the United States. The name "Local on the 8s" comes from the timing of the segment, as airs at timeslots that end in "8" (examples: 9:18 and 12:48); because of this manner of scheduling, the forecast segments air on the channel in ten-minute intervals. From 2006-2013, each forecast segment had usually been preceded by a promo for one of The Weather Channel's programs or services, leading into the segment with the announcer stating "And now, your Local on the 8s". On November 12, 2013 the promo segment was replaced by an intro that was built into the Local on the 8s segment. As of April 2018, the segment airs at approximately :18 past each hour. It also usually airs at approximately :48 past each hour during live Weather Channel broadcasts.

History of Local on the 8s

The Weather Channel has carried a local weather forecast segment since the network was launched on May 2, 1982. The segments were originally seen either every five minutes or eight times an hour at various times (airing more frequently in the morning and less frequently at night). The structure of scheduling the segments six times an hour at times ending in "8" was implemented in mid-1995. The "Local on the 8s" name was first used on April 21, 1996 to coincide with a sweeping revamp of the channel's on-air presentation; The Weather Channel filed for a trademark on the name on June 24, 1997. The name has caused confusion in the New York City market, as CBS Corporation's television and radio combination of WCBS-TV and WCBS (AM) use "traffic and weather on the 8s" to refer to the combined traffic and weather segments featured on those stations (which appear on WCBS-TV only during its morning newscasts and on WCBS radio at all hours). Forecasts are generated by a Weather Star (generalized as Star) unit, a proprietary computerized hardware system that is installed in a headend at the facilities of local television providers that carry the channel. Weather information from the IntelliStar onward is received as part of a network transport stream transmitted via satellite, which is then sent to the Star unit that inserts the localized data over the TWC feed. The first Weather Star units utilized data present in the vertical blanking interval of the network video feed. From the Weather Star III onward to the Weather Star XL, data was received via a subcarier signal on the satellite baseband uplink. The Weather Star systems are capable of adding or removing segments shown within the main local forecast segment, with the common exception of the extended forecast; these customized segments are referred to as "flavors," which allows variability in the weather graphics displayed during each local forecast segment, resulting in certain types of specialized weather data appearing only at specific times or lengths. As of April 2013, the length of these flavors is uniformally one minute and 5 seconds; flavor lengths previously varied between 30 seconds and two minutes prior to April 2013 and extended flavors of three to six minutes were previously included between the late 1980s and the mid-1990s.

Despite the name, the segment occasionally airs at times that do not end in "8" (such as 9:27, 9:57, 10:09, etc., usually no more than two minutes before the "8"s in an hour), particularly during original long-form programming and weekday morning forecast programs, such as AMHQ and the now-defunct Wake Up With Al.

As of April 2018, the segment airs at approximately :18 past each hour. It also usually airs at approximately :48 past each hour during live Weather Channel broadcasts.

Weather Star systems

A screenshot of the national-level Local on the 8s segment from November 2022.

Main article: Weather Star

The majority of cable operators (as of 2014) use the IntelliStar 2 xD, the most recent Star model, which was deployed in the early 2010s. With an IntelliStar, in addition to current weather conditions for a given area, surrounding areas, and a specific region; 24- and 36-hour, daypart, and seven-day forecasts; and almanacs (products that are largely also available on older Star systems that remain in use); cable viewers can also see air quality and health reports; specialized school day and activity forecasts; in coastal areas, tides and marine forecasts; and, in the past in certain large media markets, traffic conditions supplied by Traffic Pulse (which gathered the information in real time from intelligent transportation systems operated by state departments of transportation). Some smaller cable providers, which may not carry TWC's HD feed, use the IntelliStar 2 Jr. to provide localized weather information in standard definition.

Star units since the Weather Star XL have an audio feature, known as Vocal Local – a function that assembles pre-recorded tracks for narration of the current temperature and sky conditions, descriptive forecasts and introductions to certain forecast products (the tracks are narrated by Allen Jackson on the Weather Star XL and IntelliStar and TWC meteorologist/storm tracker Jim Cantore for newer units). This function is similar to a narration feature in the Weather Star 4000 that was used from 1990 to 1995; the narration, voiced by Dan Chandler, was used only to introduce products in the forecast segment.

The IntelliStar 2 and the IntelliStar 2 Jr are the only Star models that are currently in operation.

Three other Star systems were used in isolated cases until June 2014: the Weather Star 4000 is the oldest (having first been introduced in 1989/1990) and was the first in the series to be capable of producing graphical local forecasts and radar images. The Weather Star Jr. is a budget model introduced in 1994 that was very uncommon from its introduction, and is similar to the now-discontinued Weather Star III (known as Weather Star 3000) in terms of products and appearance, although it uses the typeface of the 4000.

The Weather Star XL, introduced in the fall of 1998, is an IRIX-based machine, a major leap from the 4000 systems in terms of capabilities and graphic generation; it was used for Weatherscan Local until 2003.

All Star systems are capable of generating a crawl, which runs a series of scrolling text advertisements that appear at the bottom of the screen during each forecast segment.

As satellite television is broadcast to a large area, this localized weather model must be adapted for its viewers. The satellite forecast segment includes national weather headlines, daily forecasts and composite satellite/radar loops for the respective regions of the Northeastern, Southeastern, Central and Western United States. Until 2008, the satellite forecasts also featured four-day forecasts for 30 U.S. cities, regardless of region (similar to the former "Travel Cities Forecast" product used by Star models from the Weather Star 4000 and earlier).

IntelliStars are installed at the primary uplink sites respectively used by DirecTV and Dish Network, but they run a different lower display line graphic and sidebar (the latter is seen only on the channel's HD feed) at all times even during commercial breaks. This cycles through current conditions (only denoting the sky condition, temperature, wind data and if applicable, apparent temperature) and daypart forecasts for major U.S. cities. The current time, based on time zone, and a news ticker displaying weather-related headlines appear above the LDL (while the IntelliStar models key the local time over the national LDL's time bar, the ticker, as with the segment rundown in the upper portion of the sidebar, is visible to all viewers).

On November 8, 2006, Dish Network viewers began to be able to view local weather conditions and radar on The Weather Channel on DISH HOME Channel 100, based on their billing ZIP code, along with access to weather information in other cities. DirecTV viewers can receive local forecasts by ZIP code, which works through the "interactive" function of later receiver models (this function was temporarily suspended on January 14, 2014 due to the channel's carriage dispute with the satellite provider, and was restored when the channel was restored in April 2014 following the reach of a new carriage agreement).

Although IPTV services are wired services (in a similar vein to cable television systems), allowing for the use of Weather Star systems, AT&T U-verse also does not provide localized forecasts through the aid of an IntelliStar computer (AT&T U-verse does provide a dedicated Weather on Demand channel with forecasts provided by AccuWeather); as such, U-verse subscribers also see the satellite forecast segment during the "Local on the 8s" segments.

During The Weather Channel's "Storm Alert" mode (which was introduced in 2005), specifically when a dangerous hurricane prepares to make landfall, the segment's :08 and :38 updates are dropped in favor of extended coverage.

As of April 2018, the segment airs at approximately :18 past each hour. It also usually airs at approximately :48 past each hour during live Weather Channel broadcasts.

Lower Display Line (LDL) and sidebar

The Weather Star systems also utilize weather information in the form of a Lower Display Line (LDL); the LDL displayed by Weather Star systems from Weather Star Jr. and earlier were strictly text-based, and therefore contained no graphical background, and also only included current weather observations and monthly precipitation totals.

The Weather Star XL included a semi-translucent background for the LDL and added local weather forecasts, while the IntelliStar system includeed current conditions and forecasts for four (originally, three) nearby areas and until March 11, 2010, included air quality indexes, travel forecasts for three cities in the region, traffic information and almanac data.

Clocks was included on the LDLs as well as the full-screen local forecast graphics since the initial Weather Star system (this function was briefly dropped in 2010) with the current date displayed constantly on systems until the IntelliStar.

With the addition of a national LDL during national programming on March 11, 2010, cable headends still using the Weather Star 4000 and Weather Star Jr. overlayed the text-only LDL over the national LDL due to the lack of a background on the 4000 and Jr.'s LDLs; the XL's LDL stopped receiving a signal to cue as well after this update. However, on extreme, rare conditions, the 4000 and/or Jr.'s LDLs will cue and remain on for a period during the day it gets cued.

In recent years with the inclusion of original programming such as Storm Stories and Full Force Nature to The Weather Channel, the local forecasts began airing only for four times an hour during long-form entertainment-based programs and some forecast programming on the channel. Local weather information was provided during the other "8"'s on the Lower Display Line during these programs. The standard "Local on the 8s" segment airs during non-forecast programming once every half-hour; until November 11, 2013, at about :18 and :48 minutes of each hour, an L-bar displaying localized weather observations and forecasts aired during a live national forecast update performed by one of the channel's on-camera meteorologists, running in a simultaneous picture-in-picture format. On November 12, 2013, The Weather Channel began to display the Lower Display Line full-time, throughout commercial breaks and telecasts of its long-form programs (prior to the change, commercials were broadcast full-screen and the LDL appeared during long-form programs on an intermittent basis).

The graphical revamp resulted in other changes to the on-air display; the LDL was replaced on the "Local on the 8s" segments by a combined segment rundown/progress bar display, with time data being moved to an upper-third graphic. A sidebar was introduced, appearing on the right third of the screen (outside of the 4:3 safe area for standard definition viewers) on The Weather Channel HD, which unlike the LDL, is removed during commercial breaks and is only shown during the channel's forecast programming; the satellite version of the sidebar displays major airport delays, temperature and precipitation extremes for the current or previous day around the U.S., snowfall reports for major ski resorts (during the winter months only), as well as a rundown of the segments within the program (at the top of the screen) and weather information to be featured in the center portion of the sidebar (at the bottom-right corner, which is covered by the supplementary localized weather data on providers using the IntelliStar 2). For cable and IPTV subscribers, the IntelliStar 2 generates arrival and departure delays for area airports; visibility, dew point and barometric pressure data not included within the current observations featured on the LDL; almanac data (showing average and record minimum and maximum temperatures; sunrise and sunset, and in coastal areas, high and low tide times; and moon phase data for the current date); and air quality forecasts on the center of the sidebar.

Music on Local on the 8s

Further information: Music playlists on The Weather Channel

Before 2013, Pop and smooth jazz music was regularly played during the "Local on the 8s" segments; the music that is heard over the national feed's forecast segments is also transmitted over the localized segments generated by the Star units. The Weather Channel released its own Smooth Jazz CD in 2007, The Weather Channel Presents: The Best of Smooth Jazz, based on collections of popular music played during the "Local On the 8s" segments. It peaked at #1 on Billboard's Top Contemporary Jazz charts that year. In 2008, a second compilation CD containing the channel's most requested music was released, titled The Weather Channel Presents: Smooth Jazz II. Stock music, classic rock, film soundtracks, and electronica have also been featured over the years. Other songs containing lyrics from artists (often referred to in the community as "vocal music") have been rotated into the local forecast cycle since then, though the inclusion of lyrical songs poses a problem as the ducking feature of the IntelliStar's Vocal Local function causes both the music and lyrics to be nearly muted (this is not the case with the IntelliStar 2) as the narration track is played in a nearly continuous manner until the end of the 24- to 48-hour forecast segment. This is in addition to the fact that the songs will not be played in their entirety due to the variable and often limited local forecast lengths.

The Weather Channel suspends the music playlist regularly used during the forecast segments at other times (which is rotated on a seasonal basis) when a tropical storm or hurricane approaches coastal areas of the United States, during which time it is substituted with the "Storm Alert" music. For many years during the holiday season, the normal music would be replaced with appropriately-themed music such as instrumental versions of popular Christmas carols and music from various holiday soundtracks. On July 7, 2009, into the early morning of July 8, The Weather Channel played the hit Michael Jackson song "Billie Jean", to commemorate the memorial service held in honor of Jackson that day in Los Angeles, two weeks after his June 25 death. It was also played during the Wake Up with Al playlists in the months that followed among other

Since November 12, 2013, a new music package introduced to The Weather Channel which replaced smooth jazz tracks with specially composed production tracks that fit TWC's sonic brand. Three songs from that package were used for the local forecasts, with a fourth being used during the segments when the channel's "Red Alert" mode (which replaced the "Storm Alert" mode in 2012) is in effect, which also suspends all music during very frequent weather situations. TWC also experimented with vocal music again from February to May 2014 along with the music package. In September 2014, a new song was added to the package; with seven more songs added in November 2014. The channel returned Christmas songs in December 2014. Smooth jazz music returned in 2016 on select days, usually four or five days per month. These smooth jazz tracks were music already licensed as part of TWC's smooth jazz albums from the previous decade. In September 2016, four new Storm Alert songs were added during coverage of Hurricane Hermine.

In March 2017, during coverage of Winter Storm Stella, another new storm alert theme was added. On July 4, 2017, and again on August 18, 2017, Weezer's newest song "Feels Like Summer" was played. On the day of the solar eclipse of August 21, 2017, music containing the words "sun", "sunshine" or "eclipse" in the songs' title were played, including "Ain't No Sunshine", "Walking on the Sun", "Let the Sunshine In"; "You Are the Sunshine of My Life" by Stevie Wonder, "Here Comes the Sun" by the Beatles, and "Eclipse" by Pink Floyd. Three new songs from Extreme Music were added to the package in August 2018.

See also

• Weather Star
  • IntelliStar
  • Weather Star XL
• Weatherscan
• The Weather Channel

External links

• This article was originally retrieved from the "Local on the 8s" article on Wikipedia, which is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License