While Cleveland residents surely won't mind if Miami Heat small forward LeBron James soaks his head in Florida, the civil servants at the National Weather Service take the threat of nature very seriously. That's why the NWS issued a preliminary local storm report based on an Instagram upload from James, which showed flooded streets in the basketball player's Coral Gables neighborhood. "Miami ain't always sunshine! Mother nature ain't got nothing to mess with," James said on Instagram. "Rain rain go away, come back another day." James' upload prompted a terse, telegram-like alert from the NWS just an hour later:
LEBRON JAMES, NUMBER 6 OF THE MIAMI HEAT, REPORTED SIGNIFICANT STREET FLOODING IN THE CORAL GABLES AREA. REPORT RELAYED THROUGH SOCIAL MEDIA.
Thanks, LeBron. It turns out a @King can be useful to the people every now and then.
Even #LeBron James reports the weather! We love storm reports! #flwx #KingJames #miamiheat twitter.com/NWSMiami/statu…
— NWS Miami (@NWSMiami) April 14, 2013