About the life of our most famous meteorologist.

Milan Sijerković, a popular Croatian meteorologist from the small screen, was born in Baošić, in Boka Kotorska. He comes from a long line of fishermen and fell in love with the sea as a child.

As a child, he often listened to old people who predicted the weather and gave wisdom about it. They knew and noticed much more than a modern man, Milan would remark, because fishing, and often the fishermen's lives, depended on the weather and its mood.

During his military service, he met a young man from Zagreb. It was this young man who helped him come to Zagreb to study.

So Milan enrolled in geophysics with meteorology at the Faculty of Science and Mathematics in Zagreb. He graduated in 1961. Two years later, he got a job at the State Hydrometeorological Institute, where he spent his entire working life.

He soon got a job at HRT, in the first team of meteorologists at the time led by Tomislav Vučetić. He spent his entire working life in television meteorology.

He is recognizable by the fact that he always knew how to spice up the usual weather forecasts with popular and humorous proverbs, which is why the viewers loved him so much. In his free time, he was an avid mushroom picker and a member of the INA-OKI mountaineering society.

Throughout his life, he worked hard to popularize meteorology among children and adults, and in addition, he tirelessly collected folk sayings related to the weather.

He wrote several dozens of books and many articles and, due to his peculiar and endearing style close to the average person, he created a unique and unrepeatable model of weather forecasting.

A turbulent life predicts a storm

Milan

Dino

- A gray head is a sign of the last days, like snow that winter has come. –

- He's really frying it today. –
- It's burning, but you can see black clouds in the distance. –
- Uuu, it could be nasty. And what does Sijerkovic say? –

This is how, with the possible changes of the verb "to fry" to "to blow", "to fall", "to sow" and so on indefinitely, many conversations have started in the last fifty years. The pioneer of metrology in this part of Europe, our Milan Sijerković, became the most recognizable weather reporter.

In his long career, in addition to regular and accurate weather forecasts, he always imparted some popular wisdom.

In April, he would explain that in Međimurje, an indecisive person who often changes his opinion and actions is usually said to be: - Twisted like April time! -.

In October, he would warn: - Beware of Simon and Judas (October 28), lest they wake you up with snow. – and it is already a cult wisdom that he would repeat every November: – Saint Kata, snow on the door! –

Namely, Sijerković watched the sky from an early age, when he would go fishing with his father. He listened to the wise words of the elders who, even without sophisticated equipment, knew when it was the right time to go offshore, plant beets, or start picking olives.

After becoming a professional television meteorologist, he worked tirelessly to preserve the cultural heritage of our ancestors and tried to bring his forecasts closer to viewers.

If he was sometimes wrong in his forecasts, he would heartily admit: –
Sometimes the weather doesn't even listen to itself, let alone forecasters. –

Always cheerful, good-natured and interesting, he became an icon of Croatian television. He could say: - A gray head is a sign of the last days, like snow when winter has come. - Nevertheless, his long gray head worked tirelessly until the end to bring science closer to average fellow citizens. Namely, Sijerković wrote columns, popular science books, children's books, gave interviews...

The source of the name of the last month of the year, he explained as follows: - It happens that for days the sky is covered with clouds, but veiled by a thick layer of fog and that we can barely see the Sun or it only briefly breaks through the clouds. The sky "falls" then, so I guess that's where the folk name for this month comes from. –

It happened that in that very month of enlightenment and the coming of Christ, our respected meteorologist also left. He soared into the clouds he had watched all his life. If you look at them long enough, you might catch a glimpse of him as well as the December sun.

A turbulent life predicts a storm

About the life of our most famous meteorologist.

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Gray head from small screens