Lelan A. Statom has been an Emmy Award winning meteorologist for over fifteen years. Since 1999, he has been part of the station’s #1 rated morning newscast, NewsChannel 5 This Morning. He joined the NewsChannel 5 Network in 1993 as weather anchor for the weekend, morning, and evening newscasts.
Lelan A. Statom
In September 2006, he was named co-host of Talk of the Town, the station’s long running & top-rated talk show.
Lelan earned a Bachelor of Science in Communications with an emphasis in news & public affairs at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. He received his Certificate of Broadcast Meteorology from Mississippi State.
His TV news career started in Knoxville, first at WTVK-TV (now WVLT), then at WATE where he worked as a weather anchor – and then some. While in Knoxville, he had several jobs (producer, photojournalist, tape editor and weekend assignment editor). Lelan also worked with Black Entertainment Television News during his time in Knoxville. In 1990, he moved to Bristol, VA and WCYB to become a weekend weather anchor/reporter.
Lelan has received several awards and honors during his time in Nashville. In 2007, he (along with Ron Howes & Charlie Neese) received a Mid-South regional Emmy award for coverage of the tornadoes that hit the area in April 2006. He has received three other Emmy nominations for best weathercast. In 2006, he was awarded Best Weathercast in the state by the TN Associated Press.
He is a past Black Achiever with the YMCA and has been honored for his work on TV and in the community by the Gospel Music City Awards, TN Lay Organization of the A.M.E.Church and 4-H.
With regards to his day job, NewsChannel 5 This Morning continues to be one of the highest rated local morning newscasts in the country while Talk of the Town continues to be among country’s most successful local talk shows.
Lelan was born in Chicago and raised in Dyersburg, Tennessee.