Liz Braden

Wake up with Liz Braden every weekday morning from 4:30-7 am on 21Alive and 7-9 am on 21Alive's extended morning newscast on 21.3

Liz Braden has been a part of the WPTA family since 2020, when she first signed on the air to exclusively forecast and report for Fort Wayne's NBC. She's covered everything from record-breaking snowstorms to widespread flooding, derechos and tornadoes, and everything else Mother Nature has conjured up here in NE Indiana and NW Ohio.

Liz grew up in northern Indiana, in St. John, about 30 miles outside of Chicago. Her fascination for math and science started at a young age. She grew up as a self-proclaimed "proud nerd," joining math and science competition teams, speech and debate clubs, and other community service organizations. Her love of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) subjects stayed with her in college, where she unexpectedly found herself falling in love with meteorology.

Her passion for weather kicked into high gear after spending her summers storm chasing across the country and seeing the beauty and destruction of weather first-hand. Liz even met her husband, a NE Indiana native, while storm chasing.

Liz graduated from Ball State University with a Bachelors of Science in Meteorology and Climatology in 2019.

After college, Liz started out her broadcast TV career in Wausau, WI at News 9 WAOW. Wisconsin winters became a fun challenge to forecast, and almost weekly snowstorms kept her busy!

In July of 2020, Liz moved out to Fort Wayne to come work for our sister station Fort Wayne's NBC. She married her college sweetheart a year later.

Liz has loved getting to go out and meet members of our community. Liz is a proud Big Sister in the Big Brothers Big Sisters program in Northeast Indiana, where she mentors a local second grader. She frequently volunteers at local schools, kids summer camps, and community clubs. Her favorite part about her job is getting to teach kids about the weather, to reach out to Liz to have her come give an educational weather talk or career talk email her at: Liz.braden@wpta21.com