Mark Woodley, sports reporter for KWWL in Iowa, recently went viral for his snarky on-air remarks after being assigned at the last minute to cover a snowstorm during the early morning hours last week.
According to the Des Moines Register, Woodley was told two days prior that he would be covering the weather this past Thursday since all sporting events in the area had been postponed. However, he was only made aware of the exact time on Wednesday afternoon. “I didn’t really have any time to adjust my sleep schedule. So I put down a little bit of what I said to fatigue,” he said. “Maybe some of the thoughts that were in my head came to the forefront more easily.”
Woodley told CNN that he typically works at 10 p.m., gets off air an hour later, and heads home to go to sleep. He said his viral video was partially the result of running on three hours of sleep, but also “a bit of who I am,” adding, “On-air, I like to give my co-workers grief.”
Woodley initially put the spliced together version of his segments on Facebook for his friends and family to get a laugh, but his sister-in-law encouraged him to tweet it out.
As of Monday night, his tweet has been retweeted more than 37,000 times, and amassed over 30 million views.
As attention towards the tweet started to build, Woodley wondered if he was going to get in trouble for calling out the station, even though he admits there was an element of truth to what he was saying.
When asked if he would assume the role of weather reporter again, Woodley responded, “I’m a team player. If I’m asked…sure. I’ll do it, but that would my absolute nightmare. I hope to God they do not ask me to do that again.”
