On Monday, CBS News and Stations named Wendy Fisher, an ABC News veteran, vice president of weather strategy.
In this newly created role, Fisher will lead a new dedicated national weather unit that will ultimately be known as the CBS Weather Network. This unit will work closely with national and station reporting teams, including more than 60 meteorologists, weather teams and storytellers across CBS News and Stations and CBS Media Ventures.
This new weather unit also plans to utilize the power of augmented and virtual reality and state-of-the-art technology in its storytelling across all of CBS News’ programs and platforms.
In announcing Fisher’s appointment, Adrienne Roark, president of content development and integration for CBS News and Stations and CBS Media Ventures, said, “Wendy is exceptionally well positioned to help build our new unified weather leadership team as we move to transform the coverage and super-serve audiences with this essential and urgent reporting every day.”
Fisher spent more than 30 years at ABC News, with her last role being senior vice president of global newsgathering. Duties included overseeing the assignment of all newsgathering resources across every platform as well as ABC News’ specialized units, including the investigative team and the D.C. and London bureaus.
She was also integral to ABC News’ coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, protests following the murder of George Floyd, political campaigns and terrorist attacks.
“In an era when weather is one of the top stories audiences look for on a daily basis, I am excited to join an organization investing in bringing together the strongest reporting teams, storytellers and technology to bring depth and innovation to weather coverage,” said Fisher. “I’m thrilled to lead this ground-breaking CBS News and Stations initiative.”
Fisher will also get some new members for the team, including Ashton Altieri, who was named senior coordinating producer for weather at CBS News and Stations in January, and David Parkinson, CBS News senior producer who has been a point person in the network’s weather coverage during the last seven years and will continue in this role.
Altieri and Parkinson will both report to Fisher.