Gerald Fleming (born 20 November 1957) is an Irish former

meteorologist A meteorologist is a scientist who studies and works in the field of meteorology aiming to understand or predict Earth's atmosphere of Earth, atmospheric phenomena including the weather. Those who study meteorological phenomena are meteorologists ...

and weather presenter. He joined

Met Éireann Met Éireann (; meaning "Meteorology, Met of Ireland") is the state meteorology, meteorological service of Republic of Ireland, Ireland, part of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. History The history of modern meteorolog ...

in 1980 and worked as co-ordinator of the

RTÉ Television RTÉ Television is a department of Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ), Ireland's public service broadcaster. Its first channel was Telefís Éireann, which began broadcasting on 31 December 1961. Since the 1960s, RTÉ Television has added chan ...

weather team. He served as Head of Forecasting in Met Éireann until his retirement in December 2017. He is now involved with the World Bank and travels all over the world helping other countries improve their weather stations.

Early and personal life

He was born in

County Wexford County Wexford () is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster and is part of the Southern Region, Ireland, Southern Region. Named after the town of Wexford, it was ba ...

, where he still lives today. He attended a local Christian Brothers school. He is married to Mary Duggan, an architect, and has three children and one grandson. He has been involved with the Wexford Swimming Club, Leinster Swimming, and the Wexford Arts Centre.

Career

Fleming attended

University College Dublin University College Dublin (), commonly referred to as UCD, is a public research university in Dublin, Ireland, and a collegiate university, member institution of the National University of Ireland. With 38,417 students, it is Ireland's largest ...

where he studied for four years. He earned a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

Experimental Physics Experimental physics is the category of disciplines and sub-disciplines in the field of physics that are concerned with the observation of physical phenomena and experiments. Methods vary from discipline to discipline, from simple experiments and o ...

. In 1980 he achieved a

Master of Science A Master of Science (; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree. In contrast to the Master of Arts degree, the Master of Science degree is typically granted for studies in sciences, engineering and medici ...

following two years of research in the Atmospherics Group of the UCD Physics Department. When he left university, he moved straight to Irish Met Service. After sixteen months training, he was deployed to

Dublin Airport Dublin Airport () is an international airport serving Dublin, Ireland. It is operated by DAA (formerly Dublin Airport Authority). The airport is located in Collinstown, north of Dublin, and south of the town of Swords. In 2024, over 34 ...

as an aviation forecaster. He moved to the

Glasnevin Glasnevin (, also known as ''Glas Naedhe'', meaning "stream of O'Naeidhe" after a local stream and an ancient chieftain) is a neighbourhood of Dublin, Ireland, situated on the River Tolka. While primarily residential, Glasnevin is also home to ...

base two years later. He gave his first weather forecast in July 1985. In 1990, he was made co-ordinator of weather at

. While on television he was noted for his tendency to

wink A wink is a facial expression made by briefly closing one eye. A wink is an informal mode of non-verbal communication usually signaling shared hidden knowledge or intent. However, it is ambiguous by itself and highly dependent upon additional c ...

. He has served as Chairperson of the International Association of Broadcast Meteorology and co-chair of the First World Conference on Broadcast Meteorology. He has also chaired the Expert Team on Media Issues for the World Meteorological Organisation and since 2005 has been Chair of the Public Weather Service Delivery Programme Group for WMO, and a member of the Management Group on the WMO Commission for Basic Systems. Fleming was Head of the General Forecasting Division in Met Éireann until December 2017, when he retired. In that position he was a primary representative of Met Éireann to the media. He was also a regular contributor to Mooney on RTÉ Radio 1. Now he is involved with World Bank and travels around the world helping countries improve their weather stations, improving safety for the people in those countries. He does this by working alongside them to determine improvements they can make. Some of this work he can do from home. However, he can also be away for months at a time. He is the treasurer of the {{usurped,
International Association of Broadcast Meteorology (IABM).

References

{{reflist {{DEFAULTSORT:Fleming, Gerald Living people
People from Wexford, County Wexford Irish television weather presenters 1957 births