‘Good Morning America’: Ginger Zee Celebrates Career Milestone

Good Morning America meteorologist Ginger Zee marked a major career milestone earlier this week. She finally received a plaque marking her 10 years at The Walt Disney Company. Zee, 41, joined ABC News and Good Morning America in November 2011.

“A magical decade indeed – thanks [Mickey Mouse],” Zee wrote on Instagram Tuesday. “This is more for all the people who have believed in me, supported me, and given me opportunities. My goal was to [sparkle every day] and pass along that sparkle – and I don’t know that I’ve done it every day – but I got close and can’t wait to see what’s next. Plaque and pin really solidify it.”

Zee thanked Ben Sherwood, the former president of ABC News and Disney-ABC Television Group, for “taking a chance” by hiring her. She also thanked journalists Dan Harris, Bianna Golodryga, and Ron Claiborne, and stage manager Alfonso Pena for the “joy and ease you brought me in those first few years. Forever grateful.”

Zee, who also serves as ABC News’ chief meteorologist, thanked her other current and former colleagues before thanking the most important people in her life, her family. “I could keep naming – but my family deserves the most for supporting me through it all,” she wrote before tagging husband Ben Aaron, her mother Dawn Zuidgeest-Craft, and step-father Carl Craft.

Zee, born Ginger Zuidgeest, was raised in Michigan and had her sights on becoming a meteorologist for The Today Show at a young age. After graduating from Valparaiso University, she worked through stations in Indiana, Michigan, Alabama, and Illinois. In 2010, she served as a guest meteorologist on Today, bringing her to national prominence. On Nov. 12, 2011, she made her Good Morning America Weekend debut and has had the chief meteorologist position at ABC News since December 2013. Her tenure at Disney also included a season of Dancing With the Stars in 2016, and she finished third.

When Zee marked the exact anniversary of her GMA debut, she shared a photo from her first day compared to a more recent picture. “TEN YEARS OFFICIALLY AT ABC NEWS,” she wrote, later adding, “I would have so much to tell the young woman on the left… but I wouldn’t. It’s been too fun to live it all. Even the crappy parts. Storms really don’t last forever. Grateful for it all.”

Last week, Zee and ABC News spent part of Earth Week on the road to show how far electric vehicle technology has advanced. She drove from New York City to Miami to show viewers it is possible to make a long road trip in an electric vehicle. Zee and her family also star in the new National Geographic show Branching Out: A NatGeo Earth Day Adventure.

“All we should feel is empowered. We should look around and say, let’s do this because we can make a social movement, and individual action is wonderful,” she said about going green. “However, voting with our dollar by driving private companies to do the types of things that we want them to do to utilize the types of substances and packaging that we want. We have power well beyond our front door into our schools or communities and then to vote those policies and those the incentives that are going to make renewable energy possible is what we need to do to make real change rapidly.”