SAN ANTONIO — Part of San Antonio's rich history is a decades old time and temperature hotline. After more than 80 years thousands of people still use the Frost Bank time and temperature hotline before they walk out the door in the morning, but we wanted to find out what else it may be used for.
THE QUESTION
Is the Frost Bank time and temperature hotline is still used by many including military installations in San Antonio daily?
THE SOURCES
- Bill Day, Senior Vice President and Corporate Communications Manager at Frost Bank
- Hugh Hemphill, fitness specialist at the Jimmy Brought Fitness Center at Fort Sam Houston.
THE ANSWER
WHAT WE FOUND
Bill Day from Frost Bank Communications told us, "The time is satellite generated, so that is the atomic clock. And then the temperatures from the National Weather Service. As many as 18,000 to 20,000 people every day are still calling the Frost time and temperature."
Hugh Hemphill from Ft. Sam told us those accurate temperature readings are imperative to daily life around Ft. Sam Houston. Hemphill said, "The way that we use it is this the military has a system of flag codes that determines how much exercise time soldiers should spend outdoors. It goes from white, green, yellow, red into black. Once it gets into the black zone, which is 90 degrees and above the amount of time that soldiers should spend outdoors doing exercise is significantly limited."
So the answer is yes. The Frost Bank time and temperature hotline is accurate, and is also used by military installations in San Antonio daily.
We did compare the hotline multiple times with National Weather Service data. It was off by 4 degrees over several hours, but Frost Bank says that is rare and it is usually spot on.