“It’s phenomenal what he’s done for our state and local communities,” a North Carolina resident said in a TikTok video praising Clark’s life-saving reporting during Hurricane Helene. “He works all day, all night, and he shares and he reports, and he tells you best-case scenarios, worst-case scenarios, and gives you solutions for those.”
What many may not realize is that Clark started his website in 2016 when he was in seventh grade — and now, at just 21, the North Carolina State University student continues to be a trusted source of crucial weather information, growing his early passion for meteorology into a vital community service. North Carolina was hit badly by Helene: More than 100 people have died in the state, while hundreds of others lost homes as the storm wreaked havoc on small towns and the city of Asheville. Thousands were left with no running water.
Clark tells Yahoo Life over the phone that he was “always interested in weather.” In third grade, he became the weatherman for his elementary school television broadcast, a role that was supposed to go to a fifth grader but was assigned to him due to his intense interest in the subject. But Clark didn’t just want to report other people’s ideas about the weather, he wanted to assess weather patterns himself. So, he went to the library and checked out books on the topic.
On the rare occasion when he disagrees with the National Weather Service, which Clark says is the “best of the best” in terms of meteorology reporting, he makes sure to add a disclaimer to his posts. But because Clark never wants to be sensational in his reporting, he says, he has built trust with his audience. When he says things are going to be bad, they believe him, as they did with Hurricane Helene.
“There’s a lot of people who like to take advantage and hype things, but I don’t like hyping, I like to talk weather in layman’s terms,” he says. “If I say something’s bad, people think it’s going to be bad.”
Clark says he’s been approached about selling his website — something he has no interest in. He’s also not interested in widening his reach beyond North Carolina.
“I like being able to reach out to people and make a connection,” Clark says. “If I go national, I’m not going to be able to have that.” He notes that, with all the publicity surrounding the Facebook page in the wake of Helene, he hasn’t been able to respond to as many loyal readers on his Facebook page as he typically does, and he hopes to be able to do that again when the publicity calms down again.
Clark’s next move? Graduating from college, which he plans to do next year. After that, he would love to make an app version of his site. His dream career, however, would take him up close and personal with the very storms he covers.
“I might try to be a hurricane hunter,” he says. That job requires flying into a hurricane to take measurements of the storm as it’s developing. “It’s very dangerous, so my mom would definitely be very concerned if I did that.”
