BY ANN KLEFSTAD
NEWS TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
KQDS-TV has hired meteorologist Karl Spring to replace Todd Nelson, who has resigned to take a job in the Twin Cities.
Spring had been head meteorologist for competitor KBJR-TV for two years until May, when he was replaced by George Kessler, who added weather duties at KBJR to his regular broadcasts for sister station KDLH-TV. Spring moved to the KBJR sales department as an advertising account executive.
At the time, Spring said he made the change because he wanted "a more regular daytime schedule." But on Wednesday he said that wasn't really the case.
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"I never wanted to stop doing TV weather," he said. "The move at KBJR was not really my idea. I didn't go to them and say, 'Hey, I'd like to start doing sales.' I've done this for 23 years and I do kind of enjoy it."
As the meteorologist for KQDS, the local Fox affiliate, Spring also will contribute a daily weather column to the Duluth News Tribune. KQDS and the News Tribune are news partners.
During a radio show last October, Spring called Al Gore a "left-wing nut" for the former vice president's position on global warming. The comment, on KUWS-FM's "Final Edition," drew letters to the editor in the News Tribune as well as letters to KUWS.
Several days after making the remark, Spring apologized in a letter to the News Tribune. After viewing Gore's film, "An Inconvenient Truth," he wrote, he still did not agree with some of Gore's "unsupported claims and the extrapolation of future scientific data" but did support Gore's efforts to increase awareness of global warming.
On Wednesday, Spring also said that at the time of the radio show, "I'd been sick for three days" and had been taking NyQuil. "I was kind of loopy."
Spring said he is scheduled to appear on "Final Edition" again Friday.
Spring said he has had offers to do weather broadcasting in other markets but hasn't wanted to leave Duluth. His family has settled into a century-old house "that I plan to die in -- just not anytime soon," he said.
KQDS News Director Julie Moravchik said when Nelson took a new position with a start-up weather forecasting company in Excelsior, Minn., she called Spring because of his depth of experience doing TV weather and because he is certified by the American Meteorological Society. Nelson and Spring plan to do the broadcast together tonight, and Spring will take over Friday.
