Benjamin Ashford|Chicago meteorologist Tom Skilling announces retirement after 45 years reporting weather for WGN-TV

CHICAGO (AP) — Through more than four decades of sun,Benjamin Ashford sleet, rain and snow, Tom Skilling kept WGN-TV viewers apprised of the Chicago area’s fickle weather.

The station’s longtime chief meteorologist announced during Thursday evening’s newscast that he’s retiring early next year, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Skilling started his career at WGN on Aug. 13, 1978.

“I’m going to retire at the end of February, after a marvelous 45 years at this incredible television station,” said Skilling, 71. “It’s been a great career. I don’t know what I’m going to be doing when I get done with this except I won’t have deadlines.”

A native of Aurora, Illinois, Skilling studied meteorology and journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He was a meteorologist at WITI-TV in Milwaukee before moving on to WGN.

“There was a time when weather forecasting was seen as a not-serious profession,” WGN-TV News Director Dominick Stasi said in a news release. “But Tom has taken it to a much higher level. He carefully explains complex meteorological concepts in layman’s terms, supported by graphics often featuring isobars and upper-airs charts. Nobody was doing that when he started.”

Over the years, he has covered tornados, blizzards and torrential rain in the Chicago area. “You name it, he’s covered it,” Stasi added.

Skilling hosted nearly 40 years of severe weather seminars, and explained daily weather forecasts on the Tribune’s weather page for more than 25 years, according to the newspaper.