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News
01.13.06
WFSB Channel 3 and CT Center for Science & Exploration Announce Partnership: New Downtown Hartford TV News Bureau and Weather
Forecasting Exhibit
HARTFORD, CONN., January 13, 2006 – WFSB Channel 3 and the Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration today announced a 10-year partnership focusing on the fascinating world of weather and broadcasting. The partnership will include a Downtown Hartford Eyewitness News and Weather Bureau for live broadcasts, and an exciting and educational weather forecasting exhibit, both to be located in the Center, which is now under construction at Adriaen’s Landing in Hartford.
Channel 3 will launch a Downtown Hartford Eyewitness News Bureau and Weather Center to provide live broadcasts any time of the day or night from the new landmark. The station will have the ability to broadcast live from the Center’s roof garden and from the Center’s front door on Columbus Blvd.
The new broadcast studio and the Center’s weather forecasting exhibit will include live weather instruments, computers and other technology which visitors and Channel 3 meteorologists alike will use to predict weather in Hartford and around Connecticut. The combination of educational weather exhibits and a real-world TV weather bureau with professional meteorologists will offer visitors an extraordinary educational experience in one of the most popular and life-affecting sciences. Located in the Earth Science Gallery on the top floor of the Center, this exhibit will include up-to-the-minute information provided by high-tech weather reporting equipment installed in the bureau and outdoors in the Center’s Roof Garden overlooking Downtown Hartford and the Connecticut River.
A major feature of the exhibit will be an interactive TV weather center set, where visitors can prepare and present their own weathercast in front of a camera. Just like on television, budding reporters will stand in a replica of Channel 3’s Early Warning Forecast Center and their weather broadcasts will appear with actual weather video on nearby television monitors. They will experience what it means to translate weather data and conditions into predictions, and then work with cutting edge graphics and other technology to present to an audience on camera. Integrated into both the Channel 3 and Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration websites, the exhibit will allow visitors to record their findings and their weathercasts for future reference or to share with their schoolmates, families or friends. The Center’s exhibit design team, Thinc Design of New York and Jeff Kennedy Associates of Boston, will work closely with Channel 3’s team of broadcast experts to create the exhibit.
“We are thrilled to join the Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration at the very start of this dynamic facility, one that will be an important destination for Southern New England residents and visitors alike,” explained Klarn DePalma, Vice President of the Meredith Broadcasting Group and General Manager of WFSB-TV 3 and WSHM-TV 3. “Channel 3 has always been committed to the success of Downtown Hartford and it is vital that we maintain our presence in the State Capital – a center of major influence and exciting future growth.”
“Few sciences catch our attention like the weather does here in New England,” said Dr. Theodore S. Sergi, president & CEO of the Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration. “Together with some of the finest meteorologists in the business, we will show the great science of forecasting in a truly exciting and authentic way. As our partner in this important showpiece of the science center, WFSB is making a very generous commitment to the project, and contributing something special to the science of meteorology itself.”
This 10-year partnership between WFSB Channel 3 and the Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration includes annual funding from the television station and in-kind contributions that include production and broadcast of public service announcements, and on-line visibility for the Center. The Center has valued these contributions from WFSB at approximately $1 million over the next decade.
Meredith Corporation (NYSE: MDP; www.meredith.com) is one of the nation’s leading media and marketing companies with businesses centering on magazine and book publishing, television broadcasting, integrated marketing and interactive media. Meredith owns or operates 14 television stations that reach nearly 10 percent of television households across the country and one radio station: WGCL-TV (CBS), Atlanta; KPHO-TV (CBS), Phoenix; KPDX-TV (UPN), Portland, OR; KPTV (FOX), Portland, OR; WFSB-TV (CBS), Hartford-New Haven, CT; WSMV-TV (NBC) Nashville, TN; KCTV (CBS), Kansas City, MO; KSMO (WB), Kansas City, MO; WHNS-TV (FOX), Greenville-Spartanburg-Anderson, SC-Asheville, NC; WNEM-TV (CBS), Flint-Saginaw, MI; KVVU-TV (FOX), Las Vegas, NV; WFLI-TV (WB) Chattanooga, TN; WSHM, (CBS), Springfield, MA; and KFXO-LP (FOX), Bend, OR, and radio station WNEM-AM in Saginaw-Bay City, MI. For more information about WFSB-TV 3, visit www.wfsb.com.
The Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration will spark creative imagination and an appreciation for science by immersing visitors in fun and educational hands-on, interactive experiences. The Center is part of Hartford’s downtown and riverfront development initiative and will be a state-of-the-art science center facility. As a non-profit organization dedicated to enhancing science education throughout the state of Connecticut, the Center will provide learning opportunities for students and adults of all ages, and engage the community in scientific exploration. The Center, which is being built between the new Connecticut Convention Center/Marriott Hotel complex and Downtown Hartford’s Riverfront Promenade, began its construction phase with a groundbreaking on October 21, 2005. For more information, visit www.ctcse.org.
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Dr. Theodore Sergi, President and CEO of the Center announces the 10 year partnership between WFSB TV 3 and the science center while a live satellite feed broadcasts Sen. Joesph Lieberman live from Washington, D.C. Click here to download. |
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Sen. Christopher Dodd congratulates the Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration and WFSB TV 3 on their 10 year partnership to develop a weather forecasting exhibit and news bureau. |
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Klarn DePalma, Vice President of the Meredith Broadcasting Group and General Manager of WFSB TV 3, Dr. Theodore Sergi, President and CEO of the Center, Sen. Christopher Dodd, and Dr. Henry Lee pose for a photo at the press conference announcing the 10 year partnership between WFSB TV 3 and the science center. |
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Artist's Rendering of Connecticut Center for Science & Exploration's Earth Science Gallery. Click for more informaiton on the Earth Science Gallery. |
