Hurricane Schwartz Recovers, Blogs after Double Bypass

Fellow meteorologist Dave Warren visited Schwartz at his home last week // Photo via Twitter

NBC10’s Glenn ‘Hurricane’ Schwartz, the city’s beloved bow-tied meteorologist, is in good spirits a month after his double bypass surgery. Schwartz, who recalled his journey of emergency heart surgery on his blog, noted that even a healthy lifestyle doesn’t make a person immune to cardiac complications.

By all accounts, the guy seemed in pretty good shape: he never smoked, ate “decently” (his word), exercised regularly and was a competitive racquetball player. Still, he was put on medication for high blood pressure a few years ago. There were no further complications until a recent vacation to Florida when Schwartz felt pressure in his chest while swimming laps and experienced shortness of breath during a short walk on the beach.

When Schwartz returned home from vacation, he went to a scheduled appointment at Lankenau Hospital for an allergy shot and brought up the incidents to his physician. According to his blog, the doctors immediately whisked him away to do some tests (he admits he might get special treatment for being on TV) and found a 99 percent blockage in the main artery and 80 percent blockage in another artery. The next day, cardiac surgeon Francis Sutter successfully completed what Schwartz fondly referred to as “the old fashioned ‘zipper job'” of cracking his chest open, a double bypass surgery.

Schwartz says he’s exercising once again in cardiac rehab and is seeing improvements, which is keeping him motivated. He hopes to be back on the air soon.