Australia’s first TV weatherman, Alan Wilkie, dead at 94

Australia’s first TV weatherman, Alan Wilkie, has died aged 94, just weeks after his fellow broadcaster brother.

Alan Wilkie, Australia’s first weatherman, has died.

Australia’s first TV weatherman Alan Wilkie has died aged 94.

Mr Wilkie “passed away peacefully” on Monday night surrounded by his three children, Andrew, Katrina and Michelle, Nine News reports.

The distinguished meteorologist became Australia’s first weather presenter on the ABC in the 1950s.

It’s estimated he read the weather 10,000 times during his long career.

Mr Wilkie grew up in the small Queensland town of Childers and became an unlikely TV star.

He reflected on his first appearance on television in an interview with The Australian Women’s Weekly in 1977, where he explained he only went for the job because his current employer, the Bureau of Meteorology, insisted.

“It was in the very first week of television and I nearly died. I was so frightened. I don’t remember a single thing I said, but it must have been all right,” he said.

Mr Wilkie was the ABC’s weather presenter from 1956 to 1960 and then he took a break from television.

He reappeared on Australians’ television screens in 1986 when he joined Channel 7 and about nine years later her moved on to Channel 9. He presented there for more than 25 years.

Alan Wilkie “passed away peacefully” on Monday night.

Mr Wilkie became Australia’s first weather presenter for the ABC in the 1950s.

In the 1977 profile piece, just after he joined Channel 9 and two decades after he first appeared on television, Mr Wilkie said he was amazed that people still recognised him.

“They seem to know all about me, they even recognise my voice,” he said.

“I don’t take myself seriously as a television personality but I do take the weather seriously,” he continued.

“I live the forecasts. My day starts about 5.30am when I get up and ring the Weather Bureau to find out what’s been happening overnight to the systems, particularly in the upper atmosphere. I have a good think about it, stick my head out of the window for a look around and then do my 6.30am forecast for radio station 2SM.

“I get satellite pictures from Macquarie University about 8.30am and then I drive up to Pearce’s Corner, not far away, and watch cloud movements.

“You can’t just rely on charts. You have to look at what’s happening.”

Mr Wilkie told the publication he would be doing a “first in forecasting” on Channel 9, which would be showing viewers a chart of the probable weather for the next day.

Mr Wilkie grew up in the rural town of Childers in Queensland’s Bundaberg Region.

His brother, Ray Wilkie, was also a meteorologist and renowned Network 10 weather presenter.

He died in May aged 98.

Ray served in the second world war with the Royal Australian Air Force and then had a long career with the Bureau of Meteorology before becoming a weather presenter for Eyewitness News in Brisbane in 1985.