The Secret Lives of Bill Walsh

Known by most folks around the Lowcountry as Chief Meteorologist Bill Walsh for WSCS Channel 5, but the mild-mannered TV personality has a couple sides to him that many viewers may not be aware of.
In addition to being a two-time Emmy Award winner and five-time Telly Award Winner at Channel 5, where he also
serves as executive producer, is known as Luitenant Colonel William Walsh in the United States Air Force Reserve of the 315th Airlift Wing out of the Charleston Air Force Base. He has served on military missions to both Iraq and Afghanistan, among many other locations around the world. He’s is the recipient of the U.S. Air Force Meritorious Service Medal, U.S.
Air Force Air Force Commendation Medal. U.S. Air Force Achievement Medal, U.S. Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal, and recipient of the Global War on Terrorism Medal.
Walsh, who lives with his wife, Janet, and their two children in West Ashley, holds a master’s degree in military operational art and science from the United States Air Force Air University and a bachelor of science degree from Emerson College in Boston. Originally from Rhode Island, Walsh has been a staple of the Charleston news scene for three decades.
As if all of this is not enough, Walsh has penned scripts for TV shows and even starred on the small screen, playing Dr. Monte Wells on the long-running CBS soap opera The Young and the Restless.

Aside from his prestigious 30-year career as a meteorologist, his 20-year distinguished military service, his personal and family life, and his flirtation with
acting and scriptwriting, Walsh has another life as a popular fiction writer of thriller novels in the vein of Tom Clancy. Author W. F. Walsh has just published his second full-length novel entitled Red Carpet Ransom.
“I would say my style is similar to Tom Clancy. I’m a student of his style, his research, and how he approached novels,” says Walsh, who has also been known to pick up the mic at comedy clubs and do a set of stand-up from time to time. But right now he says his professional life has three divisions that he has to focus on — the weather, the military, and the writing.
With the Academy Awards just last weekend, the timing of Red Carpet Ransom could not be better. A follow-up to Walsh’s well-received debut novel The Umbrella Option, Red Carpet Ransom welcomes back special agent Jake Stein of Homeland Security Investigations/ICE.
This time a major Hollywood movie star is kidnapped on Oscar night as part of a drug war of revenge against the United States by notorious drug kingpin Enrique Vega, whose powerbase spreads across Mexico, Central and South America. As the godfather is to the mafia, Vega is to the drug world. Cartel Este controls drug trafficking, money laundering, prostitution, and politicians. Vega is powerful and untouchable-or so he thought. A joint drug task force of United States and Mexican authorities track his movements and strike at the throat of Cartel Este. Vega is arrested and flown to an American military jail to await trial.
Cartel Este turns the heat up and kidnaps a major Hollywood star on Oscar night. Either Vega is returned or the actor will die. The clock is ticking for special agent Jake Stein in a life-and-death race against time.
According to Walsh, he’s in preliminary talks with movie producers to bring Red Carpet Ransom to the silver screen. And while he’s busy with book signing events, marketing the novel, which is available at bookstores or online, Walsh says he already started writing novel number three. “It’s about prohibition, bootlegging, liquor and those kind of things,” he says.
Walsh, the weatherman, military man, and author, says that writing is the one thing that he will probably always do. “I love doing the weather, forecasting storms, but writing is something I really enjoy. I will always do it,” he says.