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(CNN) – Thousands of people gathered Saturday at the Gobbler Button in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, to witness the screening of a much-anticipated preview of a famous groundhog.
"Faithful followers, there is no shadow of me and a beautiful spring this will be," a member of Phil's Inner Circle read in the groundhog's prediction roll until to the cheers and applause of the crowd.
As the legend says, if Phil sees his shadow, he sees it as an "omen" of six more weeks of bad weather and returns to his hole. If the weather is cloudy and it's not doing so, you can tidy up your winter coat sooner than expected.
But of course, his predictions are not always correct.
The groundhog does not have the best track. record
This is a Groundhog Day tradition that goes back more than a century. But although Phil has worked in the weather forecasting industry for over 130 years, he has no record of success.
To be fair, it's hard work. Trying to predict a month and a half of weather for a country with very different regional climates is no mean feat. Still, you think that he would have already taken the habit.
"You had better decide what will remain in February and March. Judson Jones, a CNN meteorologist, said we were going to throw a coin.
But the people who know Phil best do not see him exactly that way.
A.J. Dereume, one of the groundhog handlers, insists that Phil's predictions have a 100% accuracy rate – they get lost in translation.
"It's Phil who decides whether he saw the shadow or not," says Dereume. "It's not up to us to decide, we're just transmitting his message."
Be that as it may, human forecasters do not see a problem with the alternative forecast being available in case their own projections are abnormal.
"People like to have this prediction." Something to blame for the weather, and the groundhog is the perfect thing to blame, "Jones said." It's better than blaming your meteorologist. "
Why a Groundhog Makes Weather Predictions
So why are Americans looking for a weather forecast for groundhog?
Tradition has its roots in a Christian religious holiday called Candlemas Day, which dates back to ancient times. halfway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox.
Over time, the tradition has evolved to incorporate the weather .. According to superstition, a sunny sky, February 2, would mean a remnant of cold and stormy winter, while a cloudy sky meant a faster warm-up.
When the tradition spread in Germany, a hedgehog and its ghost sightings appeared. And when the German settlers arrived in colonial America, they relied on the larger groundhog to do the job.
In 1887, an editor of a Punxsutawney newspaper declared Phil America's official groundhog for weather forecasting. Newspapers across the country have taken over history and tradition has spread.
The Polar Vortex in Progress
We now know Phil's prediction – but we also have doubts. So what will the experts look like in the next month or months?
Regarding the rest of the winter, temperatures over the next six weeks appear to be average to below average in most of the country, Jones said, tilting his head in the direction of a little more winter.
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