Greg Fishel is back in the Triangle. A look at the meteorologist’s life & career
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- Greg Fishel joined WRAL in 1981 and served as chief meteorologist about 30 years.
- He left WRAL in 2019, the station citing a “personnel matter.”
- After living in Florida and South Carolina, he moved back to the Triangle this year.
Greg Fishel didn’t just face his fears. He reached out and shook their hand.
Growing up in Pennsylvania, Fishel felt strongly about specific weather events. He loved snow, but was terrified of thunderstorms.
“If there was a tornado watch — not a warning but a watch — I was under the assumption that there would be one tornado, it would be the worst one ever, and it was aimed right for me,” he told The News & Observer.
In the sixth grade, Fishel watched a show produced at Pennsylvania State University, where meteorologists provided a statewide weather forecast and explained the science behind it. Fishel was drawn to meteorologist Elliot Abrams, who became the first employee hired at AccuWeather, because of his intelligence and “weird sense of humor.”
Fishel knew then that he wanted to be a meteorologist, but didn’t think he’d end up on television.
Yet two years after he graduated from Penn State with a bachelor’s in meteorology, Fishel was broadcasting weather forecasts from WRAL’s Raleigh studio.
After a few years off the air and away from North Carolina, Fishel is back in the Triangle, where he spent nearly 40 years.
Here’s what to know about the longtime WRAL meteorologist.
Fishel’s early-career years
Before Fishel started at the Capitol Broadcasting Co.-owned station, he worked for just over a year at the then-new station WMDT in Salisbury, Maryland.
“Conventional wisdom would have told you that they needed experience,” Fishel said. “They should not hire somebody just out of school that’s never been on TV before, but they did.”
He landed the job in 1980 with a three-minute audition tape filmed at a studio at Northern Illinois University, where his best friend from Penn State was a graduate student.
Soon after Fishel started at the Maryland station, it began struggling financially, he said, and some staff members began looking for other jobs.
Moving to NC and joining WRAL
Ann Devlin, one of Fishel’s colleagues at WMDT, was hired at WRAL and recommended Fishel for a job at the Raleigh station. At the time, WRAL was looking for its weather anchor with a meteorology degree.
Fishel accepted a job offer from WRAL and moved to North Carolina. He had never been to the state, yet had connections to it. For example, Fishel’s late father, John Fishel, a tobacco chemist for General Cigar, once attended a conference in Raleigh, and brought back an N.C. State Wolfpack bobble head. Fishel still has it, he said. Somewhere.
Fishel’s first broadcast at WRAL was June 14, 1981. His first week on the job, he gave forecasts during three broadcasts daily.
“It was the best thing that could have ever happened because I didn’t have time to be homesick,” Fishel said. “I was too busy.”
Quick success at WRAL
Fishel received local recognition early on at WRAL. In 1989, he was named WRAL’s new chief meteorologist, taking over for Bob DeBardelaben when he retired.
“I thought if they like his style, they’re going to run me out of town, because we were so different,” Fishel said. “And the thing that still amazes me when I look back on it is that everybody was so accepting of the fact that yeah, I was different, and I was younger, but they were going to give me a chance.”
There were challenges, though. For the first part of his life, including early on during his time at WRAL, Fishel was an introvert, and didn’t want to be recognized in public. But he decided one day, while grocery shopping, to make eye contact with someone and say hello.
“It was surprisingly easy,” Fishel said. “And from that point forward, I got more and more comfortable dealing with strangers.”
Fixture on WRAL for nearly 40 years
Fishel remained chief meteorologist at the station for about 30 years. He was one of the most recognizable people in the Triangle, appearing regularly on WRAL commercials, posters and billboards.
Television consultants offered Fishel some good suggestions over the years, he said. But he ignored many of their recommendations, and “it worked out just fine.”
For example, they told him viewers only wanted to hear the forecasts, but not the science behind them. But that’s not the feedback Fishel got.
“People came up to me and said, ‘The reason we watch you is that you teach. We want to learn about why things happen and what’s behind it.’ And that was the nicest compliment that I could possibly get,” Fishel said.
With the help of Nate Johnson, a colleague who had a computer science background, Fishel started creating graphics, using data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in computer programs he wrote.
Television consultants also told him not to talk about things he wasn’t sure of, he said. But when Fishel didn’t have a specific forecast, but instead gave a couple most plausible solutions, people appreciated his honesty.
Leaving WRAL
In February 2019, WRAL announced that Fishel was no longer working at the station, citing a “personnel matter.”
“I have been facing many personal challenges over the last year and these issues have impacted my ability to work effectively and professionally,” Fishel wrote in his own statement at the time.
He did not want to give additional details about the departure in a 2020 interview with The N&O, and did not want to speak more about it for this article.
Move to West Palm Beach, Myrtle Beach
After leaving WRAL, Fishel took a job with Priogen Energy, a Netherlands-based company that estimates energy prices based on weather.
Priogen asked Fishel to move to Houston to learn from energy traders. He went so far as putting down a deposit for an apartment in Texas, but then the COVID-19 pandemic started. The company closed its U.S. office, which was in West Palm Beach, and Fishel lost his job.
He decided to move to West Palm Beach anyway, but didn’t like being 11 hours away from his sons, Austin and Brandon Fishel, and other loved ones. That prompted a move to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
He started working for Blanton’s Air, Plumbing & Electric as a spokesperson, a role he still has. Fishel also became a driver for Uber, Lyft and DoorDash, eventually traveling to Charleston on weekends, as there was more demand as a driver in that city year-round.
Still doing ‘O’Fishel’ weather forecasts
He also started a Patreon account, a subscription-based content creation platform where members pay to access his “O’Fishel” Triangle weather forecasts. As of Wednesday, March 11, he had about 1,030 subscribers. He has more than 105,000 followers on his O’Fishel Weather page on Facebook.
A couple of years after moving to Myrtle Beach, Fishel decided to move back to the Triangle, where his friends and professional contacts were. It took longer than he had hoped to sell his condo, but he officially came back to North Carolina earlier this year.
“Sometimes you make up a pro/con list, and you see which one’s longer,” Fishel said. “And I came to the conclusion that the cons on Myrtle Beach were much longer than the pros for coming back to Raleigh.”
This story was originally published March 18, 2026 at 7:30 AM.
