Maybe it was an effort to jack up the ratings.

Eric Wemple writes in the Washington Post those who relied exclusively on CNN for their weather news had reason to be very concerned about Hurricane Arthur. Last Thursday, as the storm was spinning toward the coast of North Carolina, afternoon meteorologist Chad Myers was delivering a near-calamitous message.

“This thing is going to be 100 miles per hour right over the top of you,” said Myers in one segment. “I consider that a hurricane.”

Also: “This storm is going to go right along that North Carolina coast. It is going to scour the beach. It’s going to devour the beach for that matter.”

Not to mention: “This couldn’t be a worst case than what we have right now.”

We all know how little storm danger there was. Even North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory reported that there were “minimal reports of damage.” The storm flopped.

So did Myers over-hype Arthur?

“Everybody can be a Monday morning quarterback. I’m really, really happy with this one,” said Myers in a chat today with the Erik Wemple Blog. “I didn’t call it a monster.”

So the storm didn’t “devour” North Carolina beach country, though Myers still notes that the damage in places like Ocracoke and Hatteras Island is still pretty severe. “The fact that zero people are dead, I think we win,” says Myers. “We at least scared those people out of the water.”

You might have "scared" those people this time, but next time they might not take your serious.

Maybe next time you shouldn't be trying to scare people and just work on a more accurate forecast.

Just saying....