Best Weathercaster

When tornados touched down in Kansas City in May, Channel 5's Katie Horner was already at the studio and completely prepared for the worst. "We had plenty of notice, the previous two days, that we were going to be hit with something severe," she says. "We had the whole staff and crew ready." Since joining the station in 1994, Horner has been compiling a library of tornado information from fellow meteorologists in other twister-prone Midwestern cities. "I had visited many of the cities that had suffered tornado damage to find out what they had done [and] what they wished they had done under the circumstances," she says. Her unflappable poise and dignity under pressure won new fans for Horner, who replaced the station's boyishly handsome Gary Amble in the KCTV A-team position four years ago. This spring, Horner will go on maternity leave for a few months. "But I've promised Channel 5 I will definitely be back in May," she says.