Sarah Long

Television meteorologist Sarah (Curtis) Long ’97 knew from an early age how important the weather forecast is.

As a child in Merrimac, Massachusetts, she stood in the doorway of her home to watch thunderstorms move up the Merrimack River. And her parents always discussed the forecast before traveling by boat to a summer camp in Maine. 

But it never occurred to Long that she could become a TV “weatherman,” as they all were in those days. So, having suffered some injuries while running track and cross-country in high school, she entered the physical therapy program when she started college at UMass Lowell.

Then she met a young woman in her residence hall who was majoring in meteorology.

“Her homework just blew my mind. I thought, ‘This is studying?’” she says. “The idea that I could study this for the rest of my life – it’s just like playing! It doesn’t feel like work.”

Long switched majors. The math and science classes were “intense,” she says, but she was driven to learn. And as a senior, she finally gained a female mentor: Mish Michaels, a Boston TV meteorologist who taught the first broadcast meteorology class at UMass Lowell.

Long took the class, although she had no thoughts of going on television at that point – “I did not like talking in front of people” – and she stayed in touch with Michaels. She also interned at the FAA center in Nashua, New Hampshire, at a private forecasting firm, and for a NASA/NOAA research project in Memphis, Tennessee.

Her final internship was at the Mount Washington Observatory, on top of the Northeast’s highest peak, the site of some of the world’s most extreme weather. She loved it – and accepted a job as a weather observer right after graduation. There, she accomplished two “firsts,” becoming the first woman promoted to chief meteorologist and then to summit manager. 

“I got to participate in research projects, give tours and talk to school groups,” she says. “And I got to do radio forecasting. That got me into a groove of creating a weather story, taking the science and turning it into something that’s digestible for listeners.”

So when she returned to sea level and married Tom Long ’97, an environmental science major she had met in calculus class, she looked for radio forecasting jobs.

Michaels encouraged her to apply to TV stations as well, since radio jobs were few and far between. Michaels even took Long to a salon for a makeover before she interviewed for a weekend weather job at a TV station in Bangor, Maine.

“I’m wearing Carhartts and fleece, and now I’ve got to buy heels and wear a dress,” Long says, laughing. “I bought mascara on my way to the interview.”

The female news director gave her a chance, and Long scored another first, becoming the first alumna from UMass Lowell to work as a television meteorologist. A year later, Sinclair Broadcast Group hired her full time for its Portland, Maine, station. 

Long worked at WGME-TV for a decade before leaving to help her husband, a science teacher, open and run a skateboard and snowboard shop. After two years, she returned to full-time forecasting at WMTW-TV in Portland, where she has worked since 2014. 

She dedicates much of her free time to volunteering. She served on the American Meteorological Society’s Board on Women and Minorities for six years and as a trustee of the Mount Washington Observatory for more than 12. She volunteers with WinterKids, a nonprofit that helps children get outside during winter. She does educational presentations for children and adults, and mentors individual students. 

Long says she hopes that she’s a role model for young women coming up today, especially those who are interested in the weather. She encourages them to study hard – and keep an open mind about the future.

“Wherever you think you’re going to end up, don’t shut out these other turns – these paths that you haven’t even thought of,” she says.