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It's Groundhog Day, and it's been like a movie in Rochester the past few days as we've experienced almost the same weather over and over again. Regardless, Punxsutawney Phil came out of his house Friday morning and made a forecast for the rest of the winter and didn't see his shadow — which means early spring. Or at least he thinks so. There's no way a cave dweller could predict medium- and long-range weather better than people who went to college for four or more years to study basic chaos theory, right? That's where “Depth” comes in today – it's time to prove whether Punxsutawney Phil is legit or a scam! With that said, let's take the temperatures last February and March 10 in Rochester, New York and compare them to the Punxsutawney Phil forecast:
| year | Phil's predictions | Temperatures in February | Temperatures in March | True or Flase |
| 2014 | Late winter | less | less | right |
| 2015 | Late winter | less | less | right |
| 2016 | The beginning of spring | above | above | right |
| 2017 | Late winter | above | less | Half right |
| 2018 | Late winter | above | less | Half right |
| 2019 | The beginning of spring | above | less | mistake |
| 2020 | The beginning of spring | above | above | right |
| 2021 | Late winter | less | above | mistake |
| 2022 | Late winter | less | above | mistake |
| 2023 | Late winter | above | natural | mistake |
As you can see in the chart above, Phil had a good record for us in Rochester from 2014-2018; However, since then the wheels started falling off the wagon. Granted, no one is perfect, but claiming to be America's meteorologist and getting less than 50% verification overall puts Phil in the fraud category. I will tell you about a weather team that is not a scam, which is the First Alert Weather Team. So instead of relying on your expectations from someone who spends most of his life underground, stick with a team you can trust.
