Meteorologist Breaks Silence on Horrifying On-Air Collapse: 'I Started to Feel a Little Nausea' KCAL meteorologist Alissa Carlson Schwartz fainted on-air during a live broadcast over the weekend.
By Emily Rella
A meteorologist for a local station in Los Angeles is speaking out after a horrific on-air incident when she collapsed on the floor in the middle of her forecast.
A video of the incident was posted to Twitter and has been viewed over 1.6 million times.
KCAL co-anchors Nichelle Medina and Rachel Kim announced the weather segment of the show on Saturday and threw it over to meteorologist Alissa Carlson Schwartz with promises of a "sunshine"-filled weather report.
Almost immediately after the camera panned to Schwartz, her eyes could be seen rolling to the back of her head before she lost control of her motor functions and fell on her knees to the ground.
The network automatically cut to a commercial break leaving viewers distraught over what they had just witnessed.
#WATCH: As terrifying moment happened when a CBS LA meteorologist collapsed live on air
— R A W S A L E R T S (@rawsalerts) March 19, 2023
#LosAngeles | #California
Terrifying moment shows when a CBS LA meteorologist Alissa Carlson Schwartz collapsed on-air on Saturday morning while doing a live report her co workers… pic.twitter.com/tQ9To9spDo
Later that night, KCAL posted an update maintaining that Schwartz was "resting and recovering" and that the meteorologist was "going to be okay."
Schwartz posted to her own social media pages Sunday, telling followers that she had been released from the hospital and was taking time to sleep and enjoy some pizza.
Alissa Carlson Schwartz via Instagram Stories
On Tuesday, Schwartz sat down with Gayle King on CBS Mornings to share more about her story.
"In the morning I felt fine, it wasn't really up until about 15 minutes prior to the incident that I started to feel a little nausea and at that point, I went to the restroom and thought, 'OK, I'll be fine, I'll get through the hit and I'll get something to eat,'" Schwartz explained, noting that she was probably dehydrated from drinking too much coffee.
She then revealed that she suffers from vasovagal syncope, a condition in which a person faints after their body reacts extremely to certain triggers, and not a result of a leaky heart valve, which she revealed she had been diagnosed with back in 2014.
"I'm now going to have to learn how to really recognize the symptoms of this condition," she told King before urging viewers on her Instagram story to "take care of yourself and your health first and foremost."
Schwartz is currently on a leave of absence from the network.
