Fall foliage season kicks into
gear over the next few weeks

Bobby began his passion for weather as a toddler, fascinated with thunderstorms and snowstorms. His passion followed him throughout his childhood, and led him into a career in meteorology. Immediately following high school he enlisted in the US Army, where he completed 6 years of honorable service, 4 years active duty, and 2 years in the PA National Guard. During this time, he gained hands-on experience in real-world weather forecasting operations, working in the flight control towers at several major US Army Airfields. His primary functions in Aviation Operations were to conduct pilot pre-flight briefings, and relay critical aviation weather information along the flight routes. His passion still lying with the weather, he enrolled at Penn State University’s College of Earth and Mineral Sciences to study meteorology formally immediately following his discharge from the military. After forecasting privately for several years, he decided to take advantage of the dawn of the social media era and began making public forecasts on the EPAWA Facebook page. On June 1st, 2012 he started the private forecast business and this website, alongside a team of forecasters. Bobby resides in North Whitehall, PA with his wife Monica and four boys.

Jim resides near State College, PA and has been with EPAWA in the private sector since inception. He attended Penn State University, and obtained a Bachelor’s Degree in Meteorology in 1991. After several years working with such companies as AccuWeather and the Radio Forecast Network, Jim joined EPAWA in 2012 as a lead forecaster and private forecast meteorologist for the business side of EPAWA. He is responsible for direct communications with our larger clients and handles on-call meteorological services for the business. A large part of EPAWA’s success is driven by Jim’s extensive knowledge and experience, and understanding of local weather patterns in this region. Jim continues to split duties between EPAWA and the RFN, where you can catch him giving recorded radio forecast spots on many popular radio stations.

Dominick was born and raised in the small town of Oconto, Nebraska. The frequency of severe weather in the summer followed by blizzards and ice storms in the winter piqued his interest in the weather and made him keenly aware of changing conditions in the atmosphere. He would often call for changes in precipitation type by noticing changes in wind direction. With the onset of the internet, Dominick was able to expand his knowledge and started providing forecasts for family and friends who soon learned to trust his calls over those of the local TV weathermen. He attended Penn State University to further his education, and continues to reside in the Honesdale, PA area. After several years working in the private forecast sector, Dominick joined EPAWA in 2015 as a lead forecaster for the NE PA and NNJ forecast regions, and you can catch him on the premium forum for model analysis ahead of impactful systems.

JC owns and operates weathernj.com and has been very successful in weather forecasting since beginning in social media as Severe NJ Weather, now Weather NJ on Facebook, with nearly a quarter-million followers that relies on his forecasts daily. JC has been affiliated with EPAWA and a contributor to our behind-the-scenes success for many years, and is partnered in the innovative My Pocket Meteorologist program for text alerts and the premium forum. JC graduated with a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Stockton University and a master’s degree in information systems. His primary career is in software engineering and information technology. Although he doesn’t have a formal education in meteorology, he is an avid and successful weather enthusiast whose entire atmospheric and meteorological knowledge-base is mostly self-taught but also under the wings of some great mentors.

Ray Leichner has been a weather enthusiast since a very young age. His passion lies in photographing and filming severe weather events. Ray took to the sky in 2014, and began using high-profile drone technology to document severe weather events across the area. In 2015, Ray obtained his Part 107 FAA Certification, and has been a regular contributor to EPAWA since 2016. His work is featured on his own fan page, where his professional quality photos and videos of a plethora of weather phenomena are shared at Cloud to Ground Storm Chaser Ray Leichner on Facebook. He uses the EPAWA live feed platform capability to reach audiences in the hundreds of thousands, which includes top-notch sunsets, livecasting breathtaking thunderstorm videos up close, views during snow storms from several hundred feet up in the air, and jaw-dropping mammatus clouds that follow severe weather.

Ray resides in Chalfont, PA (Bucks County) with his wife and daughter.

Jake is an avid weather enthusiast who has successfully crafted an expertise over many years with regard to convective storms and severe weather. He is self-taught, but well versed with many years of experience forecasting [currently] for Lebanon County Weather, and DC to Boston Metro Weather. His specialty and passion lies with severe weather, and he is able to contribute to the EPAWA staff a realistic and grounded approach that meteorologists can sometimes get caught up in with “robust” severe weather parameters suggested by hi-resolution model soundings. Jake lives in Whitehall, PA with his wife and son.

Monica is the wife of EPAWA Proprietor Bobby Martrich, and handles the vast majority of the customer service requests through the company email. She is a paralegal by trade, and works in the legal department for the St. Luke’s University Health Network in Bethlehem, PA.