On This Day – October 15th

Michael Fish became infamous in the wake of the Great Storm of 15th October 1987.

A few hours before the storm broke he said during a forecast: "Earlier on today, apparently, a woman rang the BBC and said she heard there was a hurricane on the way... well, if you're watching, don't worry, there isn't!". That same evening, the worst storm to hit South East England for three centuries caused record damage and killed 19 people.

In later years, Fish claimed that he had been referring to that year's Atlantic Hurricane Floyd affecting the Florida Keys at the time, in a link to a news story in the BBC One O'Clock News that preceded the weather bulletin. But he did not mention Florida in his forecast, which was made amid widespread worries about a coming storm: that morning, the Surrey Mirror had warned of "furious gales", so both his caller and his viewers likely believed he was referring to Britain.

Fish did go on to warn of high winds for the UK, although the storm that actually occurred was far stronger than he had predicted, albeit technically not a hurricane. 15 years later he commented that if he were given a penny for every mention of that forecast, he would be a millionaire.

In 2012, a clip of the bulletin was shown as part of a video montage in the London 2012 Summer Olympics opening ceremony.

In reaction to the controversy, the term "the Michael Fish effect" has been coined, whereby British weathermen are now inclined to predict "a worst-case scenario in order to avoid being caught out". The term "Michael Fish moment" is applied to public forecasts, on any topic, which turn out to be embarrassingly wrong.

What was the identity of the caller who had heard that a hurricane was coming?

This article is from our news archive. As a result pictures or videos originally associated with it may have been removed and some of the content may no longer be accurate or relevant.