Severe weather brought strong winds and the risk of harsh storms to Alabama Thursday night. When these kinds of weather events happen, there is usually fair warning by local meteorologists, who stand in front of a regional map and explain what to expect and where.

Maps are crucial to understanding severe weather threats to various areas — but what good are they if viewers can't read them?

According to one frustrated Birmingham weatherman, James Spann, the U.S. has a geography literacy problem. Spann, chief meteorologist at ABC 33/40, asked on air, "If I were to give you a blank map with no labels, no highways, just county lines and state lines, could you draw a dot within 50 miles of your house?"

As an experiment, Spann visits rotary clubs and other venues near him to ask adults this same question. The answers have been cloudy.

“I would give them a blank map with county lines and state lines, and I would say put a dot within 50 miles of your house,” Spann (@spann) tells Here & Now’s Jeremy Hobson. “In most every situation, at least 60, 70 percent could not do it.”

Spann started to notice a few years ago that many people didn't understand their local maps. After posting weather maps to social media, he would see 20 to 30 comments from users expressing similar confusion. Their messages would start with the phrase, “What about,” followed by the name of their town.