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Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with text Stuff from stuff Com.

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Speaker 1: Hey there, everyone, and welcome to text Uff. I'm Jonathan

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Speaker 1: Strickland and I'm Lauren Vocal Valley. Today we're all going

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Speaker 1: to talk about storm chasers and what they do and

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Speaker 1: the technology they use to do their jobs. And just

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Speaker 1: so you guys know, a couple of things you want

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Speaker 1: to get all the way. First of all, we're recording

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Speaker 1: this while there's an actual storm going on outside the office.

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Speaker 1: This isn't a joke, hopefully not a tornado involving storm.

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Speaker 1: We'll hear some thunder in the background. It's um atmosphere. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we didn't actually added in post. It's really happening right now,

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Speaker 1: So just so you guys know that. And the second

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Speaker 1: thing we want to mention is we're gonna be talking

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Speaker 1: a lot about storm chasing in general. Uh. This is

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Speaker 1: our warning, which we will be repeating at the end

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Speaker 1: of the episode. Storm chasing is seriously dangerous business. This

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Speaker 1: is not obvioust thing, um though some people treated that way.

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Speaker 1: It is you are putting yourself at serious risk when

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Speaker 1: you are encountering major storm fronts, including but not limited

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Speaker 1: to tornadoes. So we want to and um, the people

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Speaker 1: who go about storm chasing. Our professionals. They are researchers,

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Speaker 1: they have been trained um and and they do serious work.

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Speaker 1: It's it's not just all about the thrill. I'm sure

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Speaker 1: that part of it for these people is a thrill.

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Speaker 1: But but but uh, the number of tornadoes in the

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Speaker 1: United States has increased since the nineteen sixties, but the

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Speaker 1: number of deaths in the US has declined due to

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Speaker 1: these brave people's work. Right, we're learning more about these

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Speaker 1: systems and how to predict them. Now, granted, prediction is

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Speaker 1: about all we can do because these are major storm

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Speaker 1: systems that we still don't understand. So much energy and

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Speaker 1: the energy and these storm systems rivals that of a

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Speaker 1: nuclear bomb. They can they can reach above three miles

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Speaker 1: and now, yeah, this is this is serious business. So

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Speaker 1: let's talk a little bit about what storm chasers are

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Speaker 1: and what they do. So they do tend to fall

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Speaker 1: into three major categories. You've got your scientific researchers, which

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Speaker 1: I would say are probably the majority of well until recently, anyway,

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Speaker 1: we're the majority of storm chasers. These are the men

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Speaker 1: and women who dedicate their their lives to studying storm systems,

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Speaker 1: gathering data, and trying to learn everything we can about

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Speaker 1: them so that are forecast models get more and more precise,

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Speaker 1: so that we can increase the levels of safety not

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Speaker 1: just of where we build things, but how we build

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Speaker 1: them and how to get people in out of harm's way.

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Speaker 1: So that's one group. Another group are professionals who are

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Speaker 1: trying to capture video or still images of storms and

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Speaker 1: then sell them to either a news outlet or a

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Speaker 1: magazine or television show, or just to any other type

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Speaker 1: of customer. So they're trying to turn storm chasing into profit.

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Speaker 1: And then your third category are your thrill seekers who

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Speaker 1: are treating it like a hobby. They want they want

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Speaker 1: to witness the awesome power of a storm, which can

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Speaker 1: be really amazing to behold, but it is so dangerous. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I would say that really technically most storm chasers fall

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Speaker 1: into all three categories in some way, shape or form.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, it's it's it's that's true. It's

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Speaker 1: not like it is a business. And most of them

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Speaker 1: do take footage while they're in the most of them

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Speaker 1: are also doing research and are probably excited about Right,

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Speaker 1: You've got You've got some hobbyists who are just trying

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Speaker 1: to see a really cool storm. And you've got some

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Speaker 1: companies that are operating tourism where it's actually they're creating

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Speaker 1: a business where they're taking people out on tours to

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Speaker 1: try and see one of these storms. Uh So there,

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Speaker 1: it's not necessarily that you you only belong to one category.

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Speaker 1: You might span multiple categories. But that's generally how folks

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Speaker 1: kind of classify them. Uh Now, really, when it comes

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Speaker 1: down to what we need to talk about, what is

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Speaker 1: an actual tornado, because that's mainly what storm chasers are

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Speaker 1: concerned with. They also will take a look into huge

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Speaker 1: thunderstorm systems, super cells, things like that. They'll also some

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Speaker 1: storm chasers will have some experience with things like hurricanes,

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Speaker 1: which are different from tornadoes. Yeah, it is. It is

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Speaker 1: kind of um implied that hurricane chasers are not really

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Speaker 1: storm chasers because you're not so much chasing a hurricane,

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Speaker 1: you know where it is. Yeah, it's pretty obvious. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: hurricanes are very different from tornadoes. Tornadoes are, like we said,

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Speaker 1: they are pretty mysterious. We don't understand fully how they form,

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Speaker 1: what it is that's making them form, or why they

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Speaker 1: form in one circumstances, but in another set that seems identical.

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Speaker 1: They don't, So that means there's there's probably some other

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Speaker 1: factors there that we just aren't really completely aware of. Uh.

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Speaker 1: That creates some randomness in this event which would cause

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Speaker 1: them to form in one case and not in another.

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Speaker 1: So I guess we need to kind of define what

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Speaker 1: a tornado is. Okay, Well, so it's a it's a swirling,

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Speaker 1: massive air um it has spawned from a series of

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Speaker 1: severe thunderstorms called super cells, which are storm clouds that

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Speaker 1: can reach like six miles up into the atmosphere. These

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Speaker 1: are tall, tall cloud systems, and it has enough energy

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Speaker 1: to create a cyclone, a spinning air right now, if

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Speaker 1: we want to go into an even more in depth definition,

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Speaker 1: the Glossary of Meteorology says that's a violently rotating column

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Speaker 1: of air pendant from a cumuli form cloud or underneath

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Speaker 1: a cumuli form cloud, and often but not always visible

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Speaker 1: as a funnel cloud. So literally, in order for a

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Speaker 1: vortex to be classified as a tornado, it must actually

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Speaker 1: be in contact with the ground and otherwise otherwise it

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Speaker 1: is just a funnel right, yeah, So it has to

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Speaker 1: be in contact with the ground, has to be from

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Speaker 1: the ground all the way up to the cloud base.

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Speaker 1: If it's not all the way to the cloud base,

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Speaker 1: it could be what is called a gust nado or

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Speaker 1: you know some people call them like you know, even

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Speaker 1: little dust storms you'll see like a little twisting motion.

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Speaker 1: Those are not actually tornadoes unless they extend all the

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Speaker 1: way up to the cloud base. So it has to

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Speaker 1: be from the cloud based to the ground for it

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Speaker 1: to actually be a tornado. Now, usually within a tornado,

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Speaker 1: you've got wind shear going on. That's that's winds at

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Speaker 1: different altitudes that are blowing in different directions. Um that

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Speaker 1: that end up, you know, creating this rotation. Yeah, and

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Speaker 1: the rotation in the northern hemisphere tends to be counterclockwise

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Speaker 1: and in the southern hemisphere it tends to be clockwise.

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Speaker 1: But that's not a hard and fast rule. You can

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Speaker 1: actually have the same way that that you can technically

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Speaker 1: in the northern hemisphere. See water go down the drain. Yeah. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: The core Lanus effect is one of those things that

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Speaker 1: a lot of people will cite when it comes to

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Speaker 1: this sort of stuff that really applies to huge bodies,

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Speaker 1: not tiny ones. But in this relatively tiny ones, I

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Speaker 1: should it. But in this case you can actually find

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Speaker 1: storm systems that have both counter clockwise and clockwise moving

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Speaker 1: tornadoes within one system. So it's not like a hard

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Speaker 1: and fast rule. It's just more of a tendency. So, um,

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Speaker 1: there's also this thing called a messo cyclone. All right,

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Speaker 1: This is a a twisting vortex of air that goes

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Speaker 1: through a cloud system. But imagine that it's horizontal, all right,

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Speaker 1: so it doesn't as it's not. It's not vertical yet

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Speaker 1: it's so it's a messo cyclone. It's kind of like

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Speaker 1: what a tornado would look like if you put it

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Speaker 1: on its side up in the clouds, all right, and

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Speaker 1: then you get these these wind sheer uh factors, These

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Speaker 1: these sharp moving horizontal winds that can telt the messo

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Speaker 1: cyclone so that it is upright. And if it does

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Speaker 1: in fact go upright and the base of it touches

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Speaker 1: the ground, that's when you get your tornado. And like

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Speaker 1: I said, you can have a very similar set of

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Speaker 1: circumstances that in one case spawn a tornado and then

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Speaker 1: another do not. Right right, Um, what what what helps

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Speaker 1: with the tornado is when you get these inflow bands,

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Speaker 1: which are which are ragged bands of cumulus clouds that

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Speaker 1: that um, extend out away, usually to the south or

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Speaker 1: southeast here in the northern hemisphere. Um and uh. It

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Speaker 1: suggests that the storm is is gathering low level air

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Speaker 1: from several miles away and and sucking in that that

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Speaker 1: hot moist air that is going to be fueling the storm.

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Speaker 1: Right now, I've heard another term when it comes to tornadoes,

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Speaker 1: and I wonder if you actually know anything about it,

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Speaker 1: because it intrigues me, it tasks me. And this is

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Speaker 1: the term beaver tail. A beaver's tail, Am I am?

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Speaker 1: I crazy? Or is that associated with tornadoes? Now? This

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Speaker 1: is the thing. It's it's a smooth, flat cloud band

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Speaker 1: that that extends again in the northern hemisphere from the

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Speaker 1: from the eastern edge of the storm going out to

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Speaker 1: the east or southeast or eastern northeast. I'm sorry, um

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Speaker 1: and uh it It also just suggest the presence of rotation,

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Speaker 1: got you. Yeah. So, so in these storm systems, you

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Speaker 1: have areas where there is precipitation and you have areas

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Speaker 1: where there's no precipitation. I think the beaver's tail is

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Speaker 1: in the no precipitation area. So it's kind of one

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Speaker 1: of the borders of these storm systems. So if you

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Speaker 1: see a storm system that has several of these indicators.

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Speaker 1: That's one of those those warning signs to say this

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Speaker 1: is the sort of situation in which tornadoes can form. Right,

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Speaker 1: all of these situations can happen in completely benign, regular

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Speaker 1: old thunderstorms that nearly terrify your dog. And uh, wall

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Speaker 1: cloud is another one. That's a that's a cloud that

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Speaker 1: seems like it's descending from the bottom of the storm.

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Speaker 1: Um and those are actually one of the more present

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Speaker 1: that that's like your ten to twenty minute warning. If

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Speaker 1: a tornado is going to form there, you've got about

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Speaker 1: ten to twenty minutes from when that's when that should Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's that's scary stuff. And uh so when this tornado

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Speaker 1: is forming, you get an updraft, all right, and that

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Speaker 1: updress starts to pull in low level air from several

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Speaker 1: miles around. I mean, we're talking a huge system here,

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Speaker 1: and that low level air is pulled up through the

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Speaker 1: updraft from the rain area, and the rain cooled air

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Speaker 1: is incredibly humid, Like you were saying, that moisture in

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Speaker 1: the rain cooled air quickly condenses, and uh that's where

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Speaker 1: you get that wall cloud. And then you know, you

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Speaker 1: know that they're the conditions are ripe for a tornado

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Speaker 1: to form. Uh. And then you've got the rear flank

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Speaker 1: down draft or RFD and that's that's this downward rush

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Speaker 1: of air from from the back end of the storm.

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Speaker 1: That's a that's descending along with the funnel. Wow. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so this this looks like it's a bright spot, right,

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Speaker 1: that's what that's what this usually looks like. It's usually

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Speaker 1: to the rear, and in the northern hemisphere it's the

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Speaker 1: southwest side, which I think actually leads to a wives tale.

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Speaker 1: There's an old wives tale that if you were to

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Speaker 1: if a tornado is approaching and you have a basement,

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Speaker 1: you should go and huddle in the south west corner,

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Speaker 1: the idea being that that would be the safest way

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Speaker 1: from the path of the tornado. But as it turns out,

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Speaker 1: tornado pathways are not nearly so predictable. They are very

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Speaker 1: unpredictable in fact. And um and and also that that

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Speaker 1: clear spot just doesn't have rain in it, it's still

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Speaker 1: actually a space of extreme wind activity. And so yeah,

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Speaker 1: then you've got the funnel itself. Um and which the

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Speaker 1: visibility of a tornado will often depend upon how much

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Speaker 1: material isn't it sometimes If usually if it's if it's

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Speaker 1: a little bit of material, that's when it's it's most visible.

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Speaker 1: That's when you can really see the definition of the

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Speaker 1: funnel cloud. If it's hits some dust or something right right,

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Speaker 1: if it's got some debris in there. When it's got

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Speaker 1: a lot, it makes it hard to see because it

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Speaker 1: just it looks like a massive darkness coming at you.

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Speaker 1: By the way, we'll probably have some personal stories that

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Speaker 1: we can relate a little bit because Lauren and I

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Speaker 1: have both experienced being through tornadoes. Um, you know, I

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Speaker 1: I grew up in Northeast Georgia and I grew up

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Speaker 1: in Ohio, and both areas have have been the site

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Speaker 1: of tornado activity. Granted not nearly at least in Northeast Georgia.

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Speaker 1: It's not nearly to the same extent as places in

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Speaker 1: the Midwest that are in what's called tornado Alley, but

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Speaker 1: we still get quite a few. Yeah, speaking of tornado Alley,

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Speaker 1: the United States has or North America in general, has

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Speaker 1: has the most tornadoes of any place on the planet,

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Speaker 1: about about twelve hundred per year UM. And this is

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Speaker 1: because of of what's called a dry line, which is

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Speaker 1: um a center of of cool, dry air that is

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Speaker 1: coming off of the deserts to the west and meeting

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Speaker 1: up with the warm, wet air from the oceans of

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Speaker 1: the east and causing all kinds of havoc, right, right,

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Speaker 1: So you know, a lot of people will say that

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Speaker 1: tornadoes are kind of the result of cold Canadian air

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Speaker 1: mixing with the warm, moist air of the Caribbean. And

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Speaker 1: then the party gets together, and the snowbirds come down

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Speaker 1: and the crazy steel drums come up, and then we

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Speaker 1: have a big old party in the form of tornado.

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Speaker 1: And any storm institute will tell you that's gross, really simplification,

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Speaker 1: that's not really that thing. Tornadoes do occur in other

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Speaker 1: parts of the world. Absolutely, you find them in pretty

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Speaker 1: much everywhere. It's just that the frequency is much greater

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Speaker 1: in the United States after the US. North America, I

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Speaker 1: should say, yes, after the US, Argentina and Bangladesh have

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Speaker 1: the next two highest proportions of tornadoes in per year.

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Speaker 1: But but yeah, they happen everywhere, right, So a lot

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Speaker 1: of the conversation we're going to have is again, and

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Speaker 1: this comes as a surprise to nobody who's been listening

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Speaker 1: to tech stuff for a long time going to be

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Speaker 1: very US centric, but that kind of makes sense because

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Speaker 1: North America does play home to tornadoes, we get a

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Speaker 1: pass in this particular instance. It trusts us if you

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Speaker 1: if you live in a place that is very, very

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Speaker 1: infrequently hit by tornadoes, just listen and enjoy as we

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Speaker 1: discussed the terrifying experience that we have gone through as

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Speaker 1: tornadoes have uh you know, rereaked havoc in our homeland. Um.

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Speaker 1: In fact, we can go ahead and say this, we

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Speaker 1: live in Atlanta right now. UM. And Atlanta a few

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Speaker 1: years ago was hit by some by by a pretty

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Speaker 1: massive tornado that did some major damage in downtown went

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Speaker 1: right through downtown Atlanta, which is unusual. You don't frequently

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Speaker 1: have tornadoes passed through metropolitan areas. And in fact, there

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Speaker 1: were some theories for a while that the the island effect,

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Speaker 1: the heat island effect of cities might have something to

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Speaker 1: do with tornado formation. But it may just be that's

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Speaker 1: the odds, you know, just one of those things where

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Speaker 1: it's kind of pretty small. Yeah, when you when you

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Speaker 1: when you're talking about the grand scheme of things in

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Speaker 1: the city is a tiny target. And when you talk

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Speaker 1: about the entire United States, UM, but yeah, one went

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Speaker 1: through downtown Atlanta and there for for months. There were

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Speaker 1: major buildings in Atlanta that had temporary covers over a

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Speaker 1: lot of windows, like high rise building, skyscraper buildings had

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Speaker 1: these these temporary covers on their windows because they had

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Speaker 1: to start replacing all of them, some of which are

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Speaker 1: in buildings that have very um specific types of surfaces,

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Speaker 1: like we have one hotel in downtown Atlanta that's essentially

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Speaker 1: a Celin. It's beautiful, but it does mean that replacing

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Speaker 1: the glass is somewhat difficult. And there were entire neighborhoods

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Speaker 1: east of downtown that were just laid to waste, including

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Speaker 1: some losts that had just been built. They had been

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Speaker 1: converted from old warehouses and old manufacturing plants. Yeah, and

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Speaker 1: they had just been converted into the lofts and then destroyed.

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Speaker 1: Um that's all been rebuilt now, but you know, it

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Speaker 1: can hit major cities. We wanted to talk a bit

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Speaker 1: about the history of storm chasing and just that I've

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Speaker 1: got some about the history of weather forecasting in general,

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Speaker 1: just to kind of get an idea of how we've

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Speaker 1: come to the point where we're at now. Now, Lauren,

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Speaker 1: the very first date I have is eighteen forty nine.

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Speaker 1: Do you have anything before that? What? Yes? That was

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Speaker 1: the first first recorded account of a tornado. It was

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Speaker 1: sure as windy out there, Johnny is in the village

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Speaker 1: of m Rosdala, Ireland. Sure there it goes all shaughnessy

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Speaker 1: and the the The account said that it looked like

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Speaker 1: a steeple of fire. Wow, that's poetic. We usually say

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Speaker 1: that there's a tornado. It's coming at us right now.

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Speaker 1: You hear that train of coming coming around the band? Um,

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Speaker 1: So do you have anything else before? A smarty pants?

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Speaker 1: So in Professor Joseph Henry of the Smithsonian established a

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Speaker 1: network of weather instruments along telegraph companies. So he partnered

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Speaker 1: with telegraph companies and helped install these weather instruments at

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Speaker 1: their offices in various places around the United States. Uh

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Speaker 1: and the He used maps to coordinate between these these

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Speaker 1: different telegraph companies, and so the observations they sent back

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Speaker 1: he would end up not making notes on the map,

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Speaker 1: and then from that he would start to create weather predictions.

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Speaker 1: So that's some of the first weather forecasting in the

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Speaker 1: United States, beyond just the mynee is aching, it's going

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Speaker 1: to rain soon, or my dog is freaking out. So

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Speaker 1: he starts doing this, But there was a little event

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Speaker 1: in the United States that kind of disrupted the whole project.

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Speaker 1: That was called the Civil War. Yeah, yeah, that kind

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Speaker 1: of ended up taking over the telegraph lines for a

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Speaker 1: while for mysterious reasons. In eighteen sixty five, however, after

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Speaker 1: the conclusion of the Civil War, Professor Henry then suggested

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Speaker 1: that all meteorological observations reorganized under a single agency as

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Speaker 1: a means of predicting storms and warning coastal shipping. So

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Speaker 1: this was the very beginning of developing a National Knowle

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Speaker 1: Bureau to oversee this and study it and make forecasts.

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Speaker 1: So eighteen seventy was when the United States formed the

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Speaker 1: Weather Bureau, and that same year Congress established a National

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Speaker 1: Weather Warning Service under the Secretary of War. Now this

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Speaker 1: is going to get interesting because this particular office ended

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Speaker 1: up playing hop scotch with the various departments of government.

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Speaker 1: It started off under the Secretary of War mainly because

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Speaker 1: the military had the most advanced censors will not really

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Speaker 1: even censors at this point, but just communication lines, So

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Speaker 1: the military was put in charge of this. And also

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Speaker 1: it was a matter of national security in many cases,

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Speaker 1: so the Secretary of War oversaw this Weather Bureau department

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Speaker 1: and the Army Signal Corps assumed responsibility for taking observations

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Speaker 1: at military installations and warning people of storms. Uh. About

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Speaker 1: twenty years later, in nine the Weather Service Organic Act

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Speaker 1: transferred the weather reporting services from the Secretary of War

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Speaker 1: to the Department of Agriculture. Would not be the last

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Speaker 1: time that it would jump ship. Meanwhile, in eighteen seventy four,

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Speaker 1: there's a report of John Mere crazy person, climbing the

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Speaker 1: top of a hundred foot tall Douglas spruce during a

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Speaker 1: fierce windstorm and writing extensively about how really cool it was.

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Speaker 1: Storm chaser, storm chaser, early storm chaser. Also in UM

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Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty four. That August is the first known

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Speaker 1: photograph of a tornado taken UM, specifically in South Dakota. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: not from the inside, no, no. Uh. In eighteen nineties six,

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Speaker 1: that was when the first hurricane warning service was established

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Speaker 1: in the United States, and in nineteen o nine the

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Speaker 1: Weather Bureau began a regular program of balloon upper air observations.

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Speaker 1: So this is sort of the beginning of weather balloons.

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Speaker 1: There had been some work with it earlier, but this

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Speaker 1: was the first time that the Bureau itself had started

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Speaker 1: to fund a weather balloon program. And weather balloons are

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Speaker 1: pretty much what they sell. They are balloons that carry

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Speaker 1: some form of sensor, whether it's just something to measure

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Speaker 1: wind speed or humidity or barometric pressure or whatever, and

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Speaker 1: then send either record it and then you retreat the

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Speaker 1: balloon and see what the recordings were, or if it

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Speaker 1: has some sort of transfore modern lee, it will transmit

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Speaker 1: back to a computer exactly, yeah, or at least a

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Speaker 1: radio station, so you'll get some sort of report back

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Speaker 1: on current atmospheric conditions. And in the upper atmosphere where

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Speaker 1: you know, you can't just go outside and say it's raining,

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Speaker 1: you know, this is more like what are the directions

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Speaker 1: of of airflow at higher elevation the temperature exactly. Uh.

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Speaker 1: In n a Russian meteorologist attached a radio meteograph to

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Speaker 1: a sounding balloon. Oh there's some thunder out there, And

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Speaker 1: that was the development of what we consider the modern

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Speaker 1: weather balloons. So the previous weather balloons were kind of

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Speaker 1: early attempts at using balloons together more information. But this

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Speaker 1: is when we're actually starting to get information in real time.

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Speaker 1: Radioed back very early on still and by six. That's

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Speaker 1: when the Weather Bureau began operation of weather balloons, collecting

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Speaker 1: information such as atmospheric pressure, temperature, humidity, wind direction, and speed.

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Speaker 1: So by six we're starting to get a fairly robust

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Speaker 1: weather reporting system. Uh. In ninety the Weather Bureau jumps

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Speaker 1: ship again and becomes part of the Department of Commerce.

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Speaker 1: So once again playing hop scotch. Which is which is

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Speaker 1: where it still is today? I believe. Yeah, although it's

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Speaker 1: not the Weather Bureau anymore. We'll we'll talk about that

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Speaker 1: in the second also circuit circer World War two. Um,

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Speaker 1: we started to see people flying into hurricanes directly to

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Speaker 1: study them. Yes, we call these crazy people, uh, brave

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Speaker 1: people who really were really were trying to advance science.

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Speaker 1: They weren't not doing this, you know, Willy nilly. This

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Speaker 1: was wow. When that storm's coming right up on us. Excellent,

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Speaker 1: it's hitting rant forest. Uh it's a tornado. Um, No,

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Speaker 1: it's not, it's just a thunder storm. The is also

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Speaker 1: when Roger Jensen started to become active, and he is

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Speaker 1: one of the people that we referred to as an

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Speaker 1: early storm chaser, right. I believe he chased his first

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Speaker 1: storm in nineteen fifty three with his father. That's the

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Speaker 1: date that I have. Oh, yeah, I got, I just had.

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Speaker 1: Nineteen forties was when he started. But it's that was

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Speaker 1: that was a very general kind of answer from the

389
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Speaker 1: site I was looking at a time maybe in fact

390
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Speaker 1: more accurate and uh. Roger Jensen was was a Turkey

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Speaker 1: processing plant worker and farmer who got deeply involved in

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Speaker 1: the storm in the growing storm chasing movement. He was, yeah,

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Speaker 1: really one of the founders there, right, another one being

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Speaker 1: David Hoadley, And you have some information about him, right, Um,

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Speaker 1: I think he began in nineteen sixty five and following

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Speaker 1: his his first experience there, he chased storms just all

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Speaker 1: the time. He was from False Church, Virginia. Yes, and yeah,

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Speaker 1: he was very much active in that along with another

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Speaker 1: um scientists of one of the first storm chasing scientists,

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Speaker 1: Neil Ward. Uh. Again in a very early storm chaser. Meanwhile,

401
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Speaker 1: while all this storm chasing is starting and it's just

402
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Speaker 1: the earliest days of storm chasing, back in ninety eight,

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Speaker 1: there was an Air Force captain who later became a

404
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Speaker 1: colonel named Robert Miller and also Major Ernest faw Bush,

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Speaker 1: who were the first on record in the United States

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Speaker 1: to successfully forecast a tornado they actually forecasted in central Oklahoma.

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Speaker 1: They were observing conditions that were very similar to a

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Speaker 1: tornado that had hit the base four days earlier, and

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Speaker 1: they said, these conditions are ripe for another tornado based

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Speaker 1: on all that information, and so they actually began to

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Speaker 1: discuss with the higher ranked members of the base there

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Speaker 1: about whether or not they should take action. Ultimately, they

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Speaker 1: decided that they should prepare for the potential of another tornado.

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Speaker 1: So they acted as if another tornado was going to hit.

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Speaker 1: The next day, another tornado did hit the base. That

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Speaker 1: was two tornadoes that hit the very same base within

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Speaker 1: the span of five days, which was, you know, pretty remarkable.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you're talking about again, a massive area and

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Speaker 1: for two tornadoes to hit the same place within the

420
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Speaker 1: span of a week is pretty rare. But yeah, that

421
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Speaker 1: was the first successful forecasting of a tornado on record

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Speaker 1: in the United States. UM and ninety the Weather Bureau

423
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Speaker 1: provoked a ban on mentioning tornadoes and forecasts. So you

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Speaker 1: might wonder why was there a ban in place. Why

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Speaker 1: could not weather forecasters say, hey, conditions are right for tornado.

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Speaker 1: Here are the reasons One tornado at that time, in particular,

427
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Speaker 1: were largely mysterious forces that were just kind of considered

428
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Speaker 1: acts of God, that these were events that would come

429
00:25:08,880 --> 00:25:12,399
Speaker 1: down strike with incredible fury, things that would say insight,

430
00:25:12,640 --> 00:25:17,520
Speaker 1: large spread panic exactly. The thought was that you would

431
00:25:17,520 --> 00:25:20,399
Speaker 1: do more harm than good by saying, hey, there may

432
00:25:20,440 --> 00:25:22,680
Speaker 1: be a tornado on the way, because no one knew

433
00:25:22,720 --> 00:25:26,160
Speaker 1: exactly what they were supposed to do. By nineteen fifty,

434
00:25:26,200 --> 00:25:28,840
Speaker 1: they the Weather Bureau had decided that this was no

435
00:25:28,920 --> 00:25:31,960
Speaker 1: longer a responsible course of action, and that in fact,

436
00:25:32,200 --> 00:25:34,560
Speaker 1: it would revoke that ban. By the way, the band

437
00:25:34,760 --> 00:25:37,359
Speaker 1: was not always a formal band. Sometimes it was just

438
00:25:37,480 --> 00:25:41,880
Speaker 1: highly discouraged from mentioning that conditions were right for a tornado.

439
00:25:42,240 --> 00:25:44,399
Speaker 1: But at this point they said that that was no

440
00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:48,160
Speaker 1: longer going to be an official policy. Uh in uh

441
00:25:48,560 --> 00:25:52,840
Speaker 1: N five, You had mentioned that earlier about the storm chasers.

442
00:25:52,880 --> 00:25:57,000
Speaker 1: That's also the same year when the Weather Bureau changed.

443
00:25:57,280 --> 00:26:00,760
Speaker 1: It's uh. Well, there was a reorganization of the Department

444
00:26:00,760 --> 00:26:04,639
Speaker 1: of Commerce, and so that reorganization ended up creating something

445
00:26:04,640 --> 00:26:09,760
Speaker 1: called the Environmental Science and Services Administration, or SA, and

446
00:26:10,200 --> 00:26:14,760
Speaker 1: that organization changed the Weather Bureau to the National Weather Service,

447
00:26:14,800 --> 00:26:17,040
Speaker 1: which will send a lot more familiar I think to

448
00:26:17,200 --> 00:26:20,480
Speaker 1: many of our listeners. UM. And in nineteen seventy the

449
00:26:20,560 --> 00:26:25,359
Speaker 1: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration formed and replaced SA, so

450
00:26:25,640 --> 00:26:29,520
Speaker 1: that's also known as NOAH. In O A A. We

451
00:26:29,600 --> 00:26:32,800
Speaker 1: got to see the headquarters of Noah, and we we

452
00:26:32,920 --> 00:26:36,280
Speaker 1: visited Discovery headquarters up in Maryland right down the street. Yeah,

453
00:26:36,359 --> 00:26:39,719
Speaker 1: we saw Noah, and then people from Noah invited us

454
00:26:39,760 --> 00:26:42,040
Speaker 1: to go and see their stuff and talk to them,

455
00:26:42,080 --> 00:26:43,840
Speaker 1: which we are totally going to do as soon as

456
00:26:43,880 --> 00:26:47,680
Speaker 1: we can arrange it because that is mega awesome, cool,

457
00:26:47,880 --> 00:26:51,120
Speaker 1: really exciting. UM. Part part of what Noah was doing

458
00:26:51,119 --> 00:26:54,800
Speaker 1: in the nineteen seventies was establishing sky Warn, which is

459
00:26:54,840 --> 00:26:58,000
Speaker 1: a volunteer program that that currently certainly at the time

460
00:26:58,000 --> 00:26:59,800
Speaker 1: it did not have this many it currently has like

461
00:27:00,160 --> 00:27:05,399
Speaker 1: two thousand trained volunteers working across the country and a

462
00:27:05,440 --> 00:27:09,080
Speaker 1: network to to observe and report storms. Yeah, in nineteen

463
00:27:09,160 --> 00:27:13,840
Speaker 1: seventy two, you had the first federally funded storm chasing program.

464
00:27:13,880 --> 00:27:16,520
Speaker 1: Where before we had storm chasers, but they were all

465
00:27:16,560 --> 00:27:19,760
Speaker 1: acting more or less on their own. They had, you know,

466
00:27:19,840 --> 00:27:23,639
Speaker 1: no official government backing, at least not from the federal level.

467
00:27:23,840 --> 00:27:26,359
Speaker 1: And now that had changed in nineteen seventy two, you

468
00:27:26,400 --> 00:27:30,679
Speaker 1: had a federally funded program. Uh. Their first sampling of

469
00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:35,400
Speaker 1: a tornado wouldn't happen until nineteen seventy three in Oklahoma, which,

470
00:27:35,440 --> 00:27:39,639
Speaker 1: as we know, right there in the middle of Tornado Alley. Uh. Now,

471
00:27:39,840 --> 00:27:41,600
Speaker 1: I'm going to skip a whole bunch of years here

472
00:27:41,640 --> 00:27:44,199
Speaker 1: only to mention one of the most famous programs in

473
00:27:44,240 --> 00:27:48,959
Speaker 1: storm chasing, which is Vortex. VORTEX is an acronym. Of course,

474
00:27:49,720 --> 00:27:52,600
Speaker 1: it stands for Verification of the Origin of Rotation in

475
00:27:52,640 --> 00:27:56,920
Speaker 1: Tornadoes Experiment. So the e X and VORTEX is from

476
00:27:57,040 --> 00:28:00,760
Speaker 1: experiment that was led by Eric Resmussen of Noah's National

477
00:28:00,840 --> 00:28:05,800
Speaker 1: Severe Storms Laboratory or in S. S. L UM And hey,

478
00:28:05,840 --> 00:28:09,200
Speaker 1: I said laboratory instead of laboratory. You did it. I

479
00:28:09,240 --> 00:28:11,760
Speaker 1: didn't even have to think about that time. Vortex, by

480
00:28:11,760 --> 00:28:14,240
Speaker 1: the way, was not the only program called that. There

481
00:28:14,320 --> 00:28:17,720
Speaker 1: was a second one, Vortex two, which launched in two

482
00:28:17,720 --> 00:28:20,879
Speaker 1: thousand nine. But there was an unusually quiet tornadoes season

483
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:23,840
Speaker 1: in two thousand nine, which meant only one tornado was

484
00:28:23,880 --> 00:28:27,879
Speaker 1: sampled that year. It was sampled in Lagrange, Wyoming, but

485
00:28:28,480 --> 00:28:32,720
Speaker 1: it was the most intensively observed tornado at that time

486
00:28:32,760 --> 00:28:36,560
Speaker 1: because there was so much equipment present at that moment.

487
00:28:37,000 --> 00:28:40,160
Speaker 1: In two thousand, vortex To actually sampled quite a few

488
00:28:40,280 --> 00:28:43,000
Speaker 1: super cells and a few week tornadoes as well, and

489
00:28:43,040 --> 00:28:46,840
Speaker 1: gathered a lot of information. Now, during this span of time,

490
00:28:46,880 --> 00:28:49,800
Speaker 1: there were a lot of other UH storm chasers that

491
00:28:49,840 --> 00:28:53,560
Speaker 1: were active right UM. During during the nine seventies, UH

492
00:28:53,680 --> 00:28:57,520
Speaker 1: David Hoadley founded storm Track magazine. It was becoming that

493
00:28:57,600 --> 00:29:00,000
Speaker 1: hobbyist movement that we were talking about a little bit

494
00:29:00,040 --> 00:29:02,600
Speaker 1: before UM and and you know, he was publishing articles

495
00:29:02,600 --> 00:29:06,480
Speaker 1: in National Geographic and Scientific American UM. There were programs

496
00:29:06,480 --> 00:29:09,520
Speaker 1: on the History Channel in ABC. UM. It was becoming

497
00:29:09,800 --> 00:29:12,320
Speaker 1: very much in the public eye, especially with the creation

498
00:29:12,360 --> 00:29:17,480
Speaker 1: of these government agencies or the recreation of these government agents. Yeah. Yeah,

499
00:29:17,640 --> 00:29:19,440
Speaker 1: some of these agencies by the way, you know, we

500
00:29:19,480 --> 00:29:22,200
Speaker 1: talked about it, you know, the eighteen sixties there were

501
00:29:22,240 --> 00:29:25,760
Speaker 1: there was more than a hundred years of information gathered. UH.

502
00:29:25,800 --> 00:29:28,560
Speaker 1: And it's interesting that it was kind of a you know,

503
00:29:28,640 --> 00:29:31,560
Speaker 1: that chain was never broken. It it did transform quite

504
00:29:31,600 --> 00:29:35,800
Speaker 1: a few times, but they remained like the information itself

505
00:29:35,840 --> 00:29:39,360
Speaker 1: remained intact. And it really wasn't until we started getting

506
00:29:39,480 --> 00:29:43,560
Speaker 1: um uh you know, small commercial or small non commercial

507
00:29:43,640 --> 00:29:47,400
Speaker 1: vehicles UM cars that people could go out and drive

508
00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:50,280
Speaker 1: around in too to respond very quickly to the movement

509
00:29:50,280 --> 00:29:53,840
Speaker 1: of a storm. And um. And furthermore, the uh, you know,

510
00:29:54,360 --> 00:29:58,640
Speaker 1: communication technology advancing to the point where through through radio

511
00:29:58,800 --> 00:30:02,360
Speaker 1: and the beginning to satellite and cell phones and etcetera,

512
00:30:02,200 --> 00:30:06,040
Speaker 1: that we can start to be responsive right right. In fact,

513
00:30:06,080 --> 00:30:09,040
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk some more about that technology, the stuff

514
00:30:09,040 --> 00:30:12,040
Speaker 1: that storm chasers use in order to track storms and

515
00:30:12,080 --> 00:30:15,560
Speaker 1: to measure their impact. Will also talk about how we

516
00:30:15,960 --> 00:30:19,360
Speaker 1: classify tornadoes, which is an interesting story all on its own.

517
00:30:19,720 --> 00:30:21,560
Speaker 1: But before we get into all of that, let's take

518
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:24,600
Speaker 1: a quick moment to thank our sponsor, Audible. Audible dot

519
00:30:24,680 --> 00:30:27,800
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520
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521
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522
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523
00:30:37,560 --> 00:30:40,440
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524
00:30:40,440 --> 00:30:43,120
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525
00:30:43,120 --> 00:30:46,800
Speaker 1: talking about storms, here's my recommendation for an Audible book

526
00:30:47,120 --> 00:30:49,280
Speaker 1: that you can get. In fact, if you sign up

527
00:30:49,320 --> 00:30:51,239
Speaker 1: and you want that free book, this could be your

528
00:30:51,280 --> 00:30:54,080
Speaker 1: first one. It's the first in a series. It is

529
00:30:54,120 --> 00:30:56,800
Speaker 1: called storm Front and it's the first book in the

530
00:30:56,880 --> 00:31:01,080
Speaker 1: Dresden Files series that's written by Jim Butcher. My wife

531
00:31:01,160 --> 00:31:03,000
Speaker 1: is a huge fan of the series. I am also

532
00:31:03,080 --> 00:31:06,800
Speaker 1: a fan of the series. It is narrated by James Marsters,

533
00:31:06,880 --> 00:31:11,560
Speaker 1: who are Buffy fans will recognize as spoke. Anyway, if

534
00:31:11,600 --> 00:31:15,520
Speaker 1: you are interested in fantasy and sort of a noir

535
00:31:15,800 --> 00:31:19,920
Speaker 1: feel and detective fiction, I highly recommend it check that out. Remember,

536
00:31:20,280 --> 00:31:22,800
Speaker 1: just go to audible podcast dot com slash tech stuff

537
00:31:22,920 --> 00:31:26,360
Speaker 1: to get that free audio book download of your choice. Alright,

538
00:31:26,760 --> 00:31:30,760
Speaker 1: so back to tornadoes. Let's talk about how we measure

539
00:31:31,040 --> 00:31:33,840
Speaker 1: how strong a tornado is. It's actually kind of an

540
00:31:33,840 --> 00:31:37,680
Speaker 1: interesting story. Yeah, there's a scale called the Fugita scale. Yeah,

541
00:31:37,680 --> 00:31:42,360
Speaker 1: the Fugita Pierson Tornado scale. Originally in its in its

542
00:31:42,600 --> 00:31:47,480
Speaker 1: first format, it ranged from F zero up to theoretically

543
00:31:47,520 --> 00:31:50,680
Speaker 1: F twelve. F twelve would have measured the wind speed

544
00:31:50,680 --> 00:31:53,640
Speaker 1: at mock one, which is the speed of sound. I

545
00:31:53,680 --> 00:31:57,680
Speaker 1: don't I don't like that idea. Yeah, well, most people

546
00:31:57,680 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 1: would say that that to really think of the scale

547
00:32:01,360 --> 00:32:03,520
Speaker 1: and practical terms, you would go from F zero to

548
00:32:03,640 --> 00:32:06,680
Speaker 1: F six, the idea being that anything over F six

549
00:32:06,720 --> 00:32:09,520
Speaker 1: would have probably not. We never would see wind speeds

550
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:13,440
Speaker 1: at that intensity. Hey, man, don't argue with me thunder.

551
00:32:13,480 --> 00:32:16,080
Speaker 1: I'm just saying what I read. I really hope that's

552
00:32:16,080 --> 00:32:17,880
Speaker 1: actually coming through on the mic, because if not, we

553
00:32:17,920 --> 00:32:21,200
Speaker 1: sound really just crazy. Particularly so it's okay, there really

554
00:32:21,240 --> 00:32:22,840
Speaker 1: is thunder out there. You might not hear it, but

555
00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:27,000
Speaker 1: we do anyway. So the scale was proposed back in

556
00:32:27,120 --> 00:32:33,160
Speaker 1: ninete and it was proposed by Professor Fujita and Alan Pearson,

557
00:32:33,240 --> 00:32:35,880
Speaker 1: who was the director of the National Severe Storm Forecast

558
00:32:35,920 --> 00:32:40,280
Speaker 1: Center at that time. And it's kind of a weird

559
00:32:40,920 --> 00:32:43,640
Speaker 1: scale in the way. Um it's a scale that determines

560
00:32:43,640 --> 00:32:46,800
Speaker 1: the tornado's strength based upon the amount of damage it did, right,

561
00:32:46,880 --> 00:32:50,520
Speaker 1: And the problem being that, UM, we've never really been

562
00:32:50,640 --> 00:32:53,960
Speaker 1: very good at measuring how powerful a tornado is at

563
00:32:53,960 --> 00:32:56,760
Speaker 1: the time, because first of all, they're pretty unpredictable. Second

564
00:32:56,760 --> 00:32:59,200
Speaker 1: of all, they happened very quickly and end very quickly.

565
00:32:59,240 --> 00:33:02,640
Speaker 1: And third of all, they're so powerful that our sentimentation

566
00:33:02,840 --> 00:33:06,000
Speaker 1: gets pretty banged up. Yeah, it gets it gets JANKI. Yeah,

567
00:33:06,240 --> 00:33:09,800
Speaker 1: you don't really end up with like a working sensor

568
00:33:10,000 --> 00:33:13,520
Speaker 1: after tornado has finished playing with it. UM. In many

569
00:33:13,560 --> 00:33:17,160
Speaker 1: in many cases. So getting a tornado's wind speed while

570
00:33:17,200 --> 00:33:20,960
Speaker 1: the tornado is actually active is incredibly difficult. Like you said, Lauren,

571
00:33:21,040 --> 00:33:23,080
Speaker 1: we don't even know where they're going to form, or

572
00:33:23,120 --> 00:33:26,600
Speaker 1: where they're going to go from and to, like, we

573
00:33:26,640 --> 00:33:29,720
Speaker 1: don't know what path they'll take. Um, So getting an

574
00:33:29,720 --> 00:33:33,120
Speaker 1: accurate reading on wind speed while it's happening is really

575
00:33:33,160 --> 00:33:35,320
Speaker 1: hard to do, right. And of course we can tell

576
00:33:35,400 --> 00:33:38,840
Speaker 1: how fast they're traveling along the ground, how sure clouds

577
00:33:38,840 --> 00:33:42,880
Speaker 1: are going in relation to the ground due to Doppler radar. Yeah, yeah,

578
00:33:42,880 --> 00:33:45,719
Speaker 1: we can. We can track a tornado and say, all right,

579
00:33:45,760 --> 00:33:49,040
Speaker 1: the tornado itself traveled at a speed of sixteen miles

580
00:33:49,040 --> 00:33:51,520
Speaker 1: per hour from west to east, like, but we can

581
00:33:51,560 --> 00:33:53,680
Speaker 1: say that what's going on within it, it's very different,

582
00:33:53,920 --> 00:33:58,320
Speaker 1: much more mysterious. So Professor Fagitta and Alan Pearson came

583
00:33:58,400 --> 00:34:00,240
Speaker 1: up with a scale where they would look at the

584
00:34:00,360 --> 00:34:03,680
Speaker 1: damage that was left after a tornado had passed through

585
00:34:04,120 --> 00:34:07,640
Speaker 1: and said what speed of wind would be required in

586
00:34:07,760 --> 00:34:10,520
Speaker 1: order to do this amount of damage. In other words,

587
00:34:10,760 --> 00:34:13,680
Speaker 1: we were establishing how strong a tornado was after it

588
00:34:13,719 --> 00:34:17,360
Speaker 1: had already happened by just looking at the devastation that

589
00:34:17,440 --> 00:34:23,239
Speaker 1: had left. Now, the early scale was not terribly specific,

590
00:34:23,760 --> 00:34:27,839
Speaker 1: and uh was not really or maybe I should say

591
00:34:27,840 --> 00:34:31,000
Speaker 1: not terribly precise. There was an attempt to increase the

592
00:34:31,040 --> 00:34:36,960
Speaker 1: precision and create the enhanced Fujita Pierson scale. Yeah, February first,

593
00:34:36,960 --> 00:34:39,600
Speaker 1: two thousand seven was when it was updated. We call

594
00:34:39,760 --> 00:34:42,279
Speaker 1: e F not just F. So if you ever hear

595
00:34:42,360 --> 00:34:47,120
Speaker 1: like an F five tornado, that's really using an outdated format.

596
00:34:47,160 --> 00:34:49,399
Speaker 1: It's really e F five what we would say now

597
00:34:49,840 --> 00:34:52,799
Speaker 1: And what does that translate to in terms that we

598
00:34:53,040 --> 00:34:55,960
Speaker 1: mere mortals can understand? Well, First of all, the way

599
00:34:55,960 --> 00:34:59,000
Speaker 1: they determine the scale is they look at the type

600
00:34:59,040 --> 00:35:02,799
Speaker 1: of damage that's on and to the type of structures

601
00:35:03,080 --> 00:35:08,000
Speaker 1: or landscape that it hits. So to really determine that,

602
00:35:08,040 --> 00:35:10,080
Speaker 1: they look at you know, if you say that a

603
00:35:10,160 --> 00:35:13,400
Speaker 1: building was completely demolished, what was the type of building

604
00:35:14,280 --> 00:35:16,480
Speaker 1: right now? How is how is it built? How sturdy

605
00:35:16,520 --> 00:35:18,640
Speaker 1: was it in the first place, what materials went into

606
00:35:18,719 --> 00:35:21,160
Speaker 1: making it exactly? And then and then and there's this

607
00:35:21,239 --> 00:35:24,960
Speaker 1: really complex fact sheet that they have ranked out of

608
00:35:25,120 --> 00:35:27,520
Speaker 1: different types of buildings. They've got like twenty eight or

609
00:35:27,520 --> 00:35:31,360
Speaker 1: twenty nine different designations for the type of building or landscape.

610
00:35:31,440 --> 00:35:33,719
Speaker 1: And then they had a numerical scale for how much

611
00:35:33,800 --> 00:35:37,080
Speaker 1: damage was done to from one to eight, right, so

612
00:35:37,200 --> 00:35:39,319
Speaker 1: eight being the greatest. So if you had like a

613
00:35:39,440 --> 00:35:43,200
Speaker 1: concrete steel reinforced building and the devastation was at eight,

614
00:35:43,600 --> 00:35:47,719
Speaker 1: that was the most unimaginably powerful tornado that could have

615
00:35:47,840 --> 00:35:51,000
Speaker 1: possibly hit us. Uh. And then here's the thing, there's

616
00:35:51,040 --> 00:35:54,400
Speaker 1: no upper limit to this scale because there may be

617
00:35:54,520 --> 00:35:57,960
Speaker 1: tornadoes that can destroy the strongest stuff we build, and

618
00:35:58,480 --> 00:36:01,680
Speaker 1: since we're basing it on the station, you can't get

619
00:36:01,719 --> 00:36:05,279
Speaker 1: more devastating than total loss. Right, So if you have

620
00:36:05,480 --> 00:36:09,200
Speaker 1: total loss, you essentially say that was a really powerful tornado.

621
00:36:09,440 --> 00:36:11,440
Speaker 1: You know, you can't get more specific than that, because

622
00:36:11,480 --> 00:36:13,760
Speaker 1: it could be that it's more powerful than our scale

623
00:36:13,800 --> 00:36:17,879
Speaker 1: would even indicate. But after you've lost everything, that's kind

624
00:36:17,920 --> 00:36:20,480
Speaker 1: of a moot point, right right, which is basically what

625
00:36:20,520 --> 00:36:22,760
Speaker 1: they're saying with a with a e F five would

626
00:36:22,760 --> 00:36:26,520
Speaker 1: be wind speeds over two hundred miles an hour, which, yeah,

627
00:36:26,560 --> 00:36:29,200
Speaker 1: you get into a point where strong frame houses could

628
00:36:29,200 --> 00:36:32,080
Speaker 1: be lifted into the air and carried a considerable distance

629
00:36:32,120 --> 00:36:35,480
Speaker 1: before it was dropped again to OZ for example. Yeah, yeah,

630
00:36:35,760 --> 00:36:38,920
Speaker 1: so e F zero would be the lowest. That's between

631
00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:42,520
Speaker 1: sixty five miles per hour winds. Then at e F

632
00:36:42,719 --> 00:36:47,480
Speaker 1: one would miles per hour, UH two goes up to

633
00:36:47,520 --> 00:36:50,160
Speaker 1: a hundred and thirty five miles per hour, three goes

634
00:36:50,239 --> 00:36:52,759
Speaker 1: up to a hundred and sixty five, four goes up

635
00:36:52,800 --> 00:36:55,600
Speaker 1: to two hundred and then anything over that, Yeah, e

636
00:36:55,680 --> 00:36:58,560
Speaker 1: F five now and in the old scale you had

637
00:36:58,680 --> 00:37:02,440
Speaker 1: up to F six really was what was being described.

638
00:37:02,719 --> 00:37:04,920
Speaker 1: And under that old scale, and F six tornado was

639
00:37:04,960 --> 00:37:10,160
Speaker 1: called an inconceivable tornado? Was it for real? Yes, that's amazing.

640
00:37:10,239 --> 00:37:12,600
Speaker 1: I don't think that tornado means what you think it means,

641
00:37:13,480 --> 00:37:15,879
Speaker 1: um But at that point they said that the wind

642
00:37:15,920 --> 00:37:20,000
Speaker 1: speeds were unlikely to happen at that intensity that was

643
00:37:20,400 --> 00:37:23,120
Speaker 1: described as three hundred and nineteen to three hundred and

644
00:37:23,120 --> 00:37:25,920
Speaker 1: seventy nine miles per hour. I think the highest on

645
00:37:26,040 --> 00:37:31,480
Speaker 1: record is three, I believe, which is why would be

646
00:37:31,520 --> 00:37:34,040
Speaker 1: the F six And that the idea here was that

647
00:37:34,360 --> 00:37:36,560
Speaker 1: you might not even be able to tell that it

648
00:37:36,760 --> 00:37:40,799
Speaker 1: was in F six tornado because anything from F five

649
00:37:40,840 --> 00:37:44,520
Speaker 1: would leave essentially total devastation in its wake, right, so

650
00:37:46,600 --> 00:37:49,120
Speaker 1: more total the station. They said that essentially you would

651
00:37:49,120 --> 00:37:51,520
Speaker 1: have to verify it by looking at the evidence of

652
00:37:51,520 --> 00:37:55,440
Speaker 1: the ground swirl pattern left behind. Yeah, it's kind of crazy.

653
00:37:55,480 --> 00:37:58,560
Speaker 1: So the point being that it's about the best we

654
00:37:58,640 --> 00:38:02,399
Speaker 1: can do simply because again, it's really hard to get

655
00:38:02,400 --> 00:38:05,279
Speaker 1: a read on a tornado while it's happening. We really

656
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:08,759
Speaker 1: can only look at what happened afterward and say, well,

657
00:38:08,800 --> 00:38:13,120
Speaker 1: based upon this, we deduce the tornado was x strong.

658
00:38:13,840 --> 00:38:16,640
Speaker 1: You know. So with that in mind, what aren't the

659
00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:20,799
Speaker 1: kind of gear that we use for storm chasing and

660
00:38:20,880 --> 00:38:22,640
Speaker 1: measuring this kind of stuff? I mean, you've got your

661
00:38:22,680 --> 00:38:27,880
Speaker 1: basic weather uh sensors, things like a barometer, which reads

662
00:38:27,920 --> 00:38:31,920
Speaker 1: barometric pressure. In general, tornado's form after a drop in

663
00:38:32,080 --> 00:38:34,799
Speaker 1: air pressure, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's a

664
00:38:34,840 --> 00:38:38,160
Speaker 1: sudden drop followed by a tornado. The drop can actually

665
00:38:38,160 --> 00:38:41,200
Speaker 1: happen several days before a tornado forms if there's a

666
00:38:41,239 --> 00:38:44,439
Speaker 1: low pressure system moving in on a broad scale, So

667
00:38:44,760 --> 00:38:48,640
Speaker 1: it's also very difficult to measure barometric pressure within a

668
00:38:48,640 --> 00:38:52,319
Speaker 1: tornado because the instruments very rarely survived. However, we will

669
00:38:52,320 --> 00:38:56,080
Speaker 1: talk about uh, someone who did manage to do that.

670
00:38:56,080 --> 00:38:58,319
Speaker 1: That will be towards the end of our podcast. Um.

671
00:38:58,400 --> 00:39:05,480
Speaker 1: Then there's the anemometer, right, There's there's blade and anamometers

672
00:39:05,600 --> 00:39:08,880
Speaker 1: and thermometers, and I had to I had to steady

673
00:39:08,960 --> 00:39:13,399
Speaker 1: myself to say anemometer did you didn't need to release afterwards. Um,

674
00:39:13,520 --> 00:39:16,960
Speaker 1: And the analog blade ones are UM. If you've ever

675
00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:20,760
Speaker 1: seen a like a spoken series of arms or cups

676
00:39:20,840 --> 00:39:25,960
Speaker 1: perched atop building cylinder, that's that is why. Yeah, it's

677
00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:28,120
Speaker 1: designed to measure wind speed. So if you've ever seen

678
00:39:28,160 --> 00:39:30,279
Speaker 1: one of those things, it looks like it's a little

679
00:39:30,280 --> 00:39:33,720
Speaker 1: pin wheel type thing, sometimes horizontally aligned with little cups

680
00:39:33,719 --> 00:39:35,960
Speaker 1: at the end of the arms. It's spinning around in

681
00:39:36,000 --> 00:39:38,759
Speaker 1: a circle. Uh. This does not tell us anything about

682
00:39:38,760 --> 00:39:41,920
Speaker 1: wind direction, but it does tell us about wind speed. Essentially,

683
00:39:41,920 --> 00:39:45,520
Speaker 1: you're talking about how quickly is this thing spinning, and

684
00:39:45,560 --> 00:39:48,799
Speaker 1: from that we can derive how how fast the wind

685
00:39:48,920 --> 00:39:51,560
Speaker 1: is blowing. It only really works at the wind is

686
00:39:51,600 --> 00:39:53,680
Speaker 1: blowing in a steady direction. If it starts blowing in

687
00:39:53,800 --> 00:39:57,840
Speaker 1: various directions, that can really mess with the readings. But um,

688
00:39:57,960 --> 00:40:00,239
Speaker 1: you know that that's how we kind of them in

689
00:40:00,280 --> 00:40:03,759
Speaker 1: wind speed. Of course, thermometers tell us things about temperature, uh,

690
00:40:03,800 --> 00:40:06,560
Speaker 1: and we can learn about humidity through various means. So

691
00:40:06,800 --> 00:40:09,839
Speaker 1: getting to the basic gears of storm chasers, a lot

692
00:40:09,880 --> 00:40:11,719
Speaker 1: of the basic gears. The kind of stuff that you

693
00:40:11,840 --> 00:40:15,600
Speaker 1: might have at your disposal already, things like laptop computers,

694
00:40:15,960 --> 00:40:20,200
Speaker 1: WiFi uh, digital cameras, Yeah, video cameras that are both

695
00:40:20,280 --> 00:40:25,560
Speaker 1: for video or for still photography, radio's, walkie talkies, ham

696
00:40:25,680 --> 00:40:29,200
Speaker 1: CB anything that they can get their hands on, police scanners,

697
00:40:29,320 --> 00:40:31,480
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. Stuff that allows them to keep

698
00:40:31,520 --> 00:40:34,920
Speaker 1: track of the movement of weather systems. Uh, you know,

699
00:40:35,000 --> 00:40:36,719
Speaker 1: anything that will give them the most up to date,

700
00:40:36,960 --> 00:40:41,120
Speaker 1: mediate communication with anyone who is providing information about that storm. Right.

701
00:40:41,160 --> 00:40:43,359
Speaker 1: And then you know, the video cameras are obviously there

702
00:40:43,400 --> 00:40:46,719
Speaker 1: to document the actual storms, to watch their behavior, to

703
00:40:46,880 --> 00:40:50,319
Speaker 1: take footage, possibly to sell that footage later on, or

704
00:40:50,360 --> 00:40:52,680
Speaker 1: maybe it's just so that you can use it for

705
00:40:53,200 --> 00:40:56,800
Speaker 1: research purposes. Uh. It could be a combination to purposes

706
00:40:56,880 --> 00:41:00,480
Speaker 1: journalistic purposes obviously. Yeah. And so those are those are

707
00:41:00,480 --> 00:41:05,839
Speaker 1: your basic, uh pieces of equipment. There's some interesting approaches

708
00:41:05,960 --> 00:41:09,279
Speaker 1: to studying tornadoes, some of which are not necessarily used

709
00:41:09,280 --> 00:41:13,279
Speaker 1: that frequently today. Did you run into the term tornado

710
00:41:13,400 --> 00:41:17,319
Speaker 1: photo grammy tree? I did not. Photography tree is an

711
00:41:17,320 --> 00:41:20,000
Speaker 1: older form and we don't tend to use it as

712
00:41:20,080 --> 00:41:23,120
Speaker 1: much because it's not terribly precise. Let's the use of

713
00:41:23,200 --> 00:41:26,359
Speaker 1: film or video to determine the speed of movement of

714
00:41:26,440 --> 00:41:30,160
Speaker 1: some kind of tracer element. So you take a tracer

715
00:41:30,160 --> 00:41:33,080
Speaker 1: element as a point of reference. This is not necessarily

716
00:41:33,120 --> 00:41:35,520
Speaker 1: something that you've introduced to the tornado. It may be

717
00:41:35,640 --> 00:41:37,840
Speaker 1: something that the tornado has already picked up, like I

718
00:41:37,880 --> 00:41:41,279
Speaker 1: don't know, a tractor, and it's usually a large piece

719
00:41:41,280 --> 00:41:44,759
Speaker 1: of debris of or some sort of persistent element in

720
00:41:44,800 --> 00:41:47,920
Speaker 1: the cloud itself. And from this you can start to

721
00:41:48,200 --> 00:41:51,359
Speaker 1: infer what the wind speed is UH with varying and

722
00:41:51,440 --> 00:41:57,520
Speaker 1: sometimes unknown reliability. So you analyze how the wind speed

723
00:41:57,600 --> 00:42:02,080
Speaker 1: is by measuring the movement of this this persistent element.

724
00:42:02,480 --> 00:42:05,040
Speaker 1: You know, you're how frequently is it coming around over

725
00:42:05,080 --> 00:42:07,040
Speaker 1: and over, and from that you can sit there and say, well,

726
00:42:07,200 --> 00:42:10,480
Speaker 1: the wind speed appears to be this. It was used

727
00:42:10,480 --> 00:42:12,960
Speaker 1: more in the nineteen seventies and the nineteen eighties, but

728
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:17,120
Speaker 1: we kind of replace this with something that's far more reliable,

729
00:42:17,600 --> 00:42:21,800
Speaker 1: namely Doppler radar. UH. In fact, we have Doppler radar

730
00:42:21,880 --> 00:42:26,520
Speaker 1: that's mobile. It's called Doppler on wheels or Dow Dow

731
00:42:26,960 --> 00:42:29,520
Speaker 1: and Doppler on wheels. Those are the main tools used

732
00:42:29,520 --> 00:42:32,840
Speaker 1: in the effort to determine the strength of tornado winds today.

733
00:42:32,920 --> 00:42:35,960
Speaker 1: So that raises the question what is Doppler radar and

734
00:42:36,000 --> 00:42:40,400
Speaker 1: how does that work? Well. The Doppler effect we we

735
00:42:40,440 --> 00:42:42,799
Speaker 1: have talked about on the show before, but it is

736
00:42:43,360 --> 00:42:49,680
Speaker 1: the effect of electromagnetic waves crunching up as something moves

737
00:42:49,680 --> 00:42:52,080
Speaker 1: towards you, right right. It's same thing with sound, right,

738
00:42:52,120 --> 00:42:54,920
Speaker 1: So it's not it's any kind of wave. If it's

739
00:42:54,960 --> 00:42:58,880
Speaker 1: moving toward you, the frequency of the wave increases because

740
00:42:59,000 --> 00:43:01,960
Speaker 1: the object is actually moving, uh, towards you. If it's

741
00:43:02,000 --> 00:43:06,239
Speaker 1: moving away, the frequency decreases. Those waves along gate. So

742
00:43:06,520 --> 00:43:09,480
Speaker 1: in sound and for once, it's amazing that we can't

743
00:43:09,520 --> 00:43:11,920
Speaker 1: hear it because whenever we record tech stuff there seems

744
00:43:11,920 --> 00:43:15,319
Speaker 1: to always be sirens going off in the background. But

745
00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:18,760
Speaker 1: with sound, like if a police car has its siren

746
00:43:18,800 --> 00:43:20,600
Speaker 1: running and it's coming towards you, you might hear a

747
00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:23,359
Speaker 1: higher pitch and then after it passes you, it goes

748
00:43:23,400 --> 00:43:26,320
Speaker 1: to a lower pitch. That's an example of the Doppler

749
00:43:26,360 --> 00:43:29,760
Speaker 1: effect with sound waves. Same thing is true with electromagnetic waves,

750
00:43:29,800 --> 00:43:32,839
Speaker 1: and radar uses electronmagnetic waves to kind of get an

751
00:43:32,880 --> 00:43:36,319
Speaker 1: idea of where other objects are radio waves, right, um,

752
00:43:36,360 --> 00:43:39,640
Speaker 1: it's it will shoot a very quick like millisecond burst

753
00:43:39,680 --> 00:43:42,239
Speaker 1: of radio waves called a pulse, called a pulse out

754
00:43:42,760 --> 00:43:46,000
Speaker 1: you know, hopefully towards an object or sometimes just to

755
00:43:46,000 --> 00:43:48,120
Speaker 1: see what's out there and um. And then it will

756
00:43:48,280 --> 00:43:51,400
Speaker 1: measure the length of time between when it's sent and

757
00:43:51,440 --> 00:43:55,200
Speaker 1: when an echo comes back. And we'll also measure the

758
00:43:55,200 --> 00:43:58,440
Speaker 1: the the Doppler effect, the phase, the phase of that

759
00:43:58,640 --> 00:44:01,080
Speaker 1: of that wave, So between phase of the wave and

760
00:44:01,120 --> 00:44:03,360
Speaker 1: how long it took for the wave to return back

761
00:44:03,480 --> 00:44:06,320
Speaker 1: from the echo of the wave to return back, it

762
00:44:06,400 --> 00:44:10,400
Speaker 1: can determine the location and uh, and whether or not

763
00:44:10,520 --> 00:44:12,840
Speaker 1: something's moving toward it or away from it, and in

764
00:44:12,880 --> 00:44:17,040
Speaker 1: a vague concept of how fast by kind of mathematically computing, Yeah,

765
00:44:17,320 --> 00:44:20,239
Speaker 1: if you measure between pulses, you start to get an idea, Oh, well,

766
00:44:20,320 --> 00:44:22,000
Speaker 1: not only is it moving towards me, but it's moving

767
00:44:22,000 --> 00:44:26,720
Speaker 1: towards me at this general speed. So double on wheels

768
00:44:26,760 --> 00:44:29,040
Speaker 1: of course very useful because that means you can move

769
00:44:29,160 --> 00:44:31,920
Speaker 1: the the the radar around so that you can get

770
00:44:31,960 --> 00:44:34,360
Speaker 1: a better idea of the speed of the storm itself

771
00:44:34,600 --> 00:44:37,920
Speaker 1: and even get an idea of the strength of the tornado. Right. However,

772
00:44:38,320 --> 00:44:40,600
Speaker 1: these these vehicles have to stay between two and eight

773
00:44:40,600 --> 00:44:43,839
Speaker 1: miles away from a tornado to be effective, right, And

774
00:44:43,880 --> 00:44:48,080
Speaker 1: it's mostly effective if it's encountering stuff that is fairly

775
00:44:48,360 --> 00:44:50,840
Speaker 1: large in the in the relative scheme of things. So

776
00:44:50,880 --> 00:44:54,640
Speaker 1: in other words, if there's precipitation, that's great. That means

777
00:44:54,680 --> 00:44:57,840
Speaker 1: that there's more stuff for the radar waves to bounce

778
00:44:57,880 --> 00:45:01,160
Speaker 1: off of, and that could be. If it's larger raintrops,

779
00:45:01,200 --> 00:45:04,640
Speaker 1: that's even better. If it's hailstones, that's fantastic because that

780
00:45:04,800 --> 00:45:08,959
Speaker 1: gets a lot more for the doppler. For anyone who's

781
00:45:09,000 --> 00:45:12,239
Speaker 1: caught underneath it. Hailstones are terrible. You do not want

782
00:45:12,239 --> 00:45:15,000
Speaker 1: to be under them. But for for the purposes of radar,

783
00:45:15,239 --> 00:45:18,400
Speaker 1: it works really, really well. And I think the strongest

784
00:45:18,440 --> 00:45:22,359
Speaker 1: wind speed determined from a DOW is um at least

785
00:45:22,360 --> 00:45:24,560
Speaker 1: from the data I was able to find. Keep in mind,

786
00:45:24,600 --> 00:45:27,960
Speaker 1: some of this data is several years old because all

787
00:45:28,000 --> 00:45:31,160
Speaker 1: of it comes from government sources and reports can take

788
00:45:31,160 --> 00:45:36,560
Speaker 1: a while and to become publicly available. But the strongest

789
00:45:36,600 --> 00:45:39,200
Speaker 1: I was able to find was three hundred and two

790
00:45:39,239 --> 00:45:42,680
Speaker 1: miles per hour. So I saw I saw a report

791
00:45:42,719 --> 00:45:47,840
Speaker 1: of one from Oklahoma that that that recorded the world

792
00:45:47,840 --> 00:45:52,720
Speaker 1: record speed of three eight Okay, gotcha, gotcha. Yeah, my

793
00:45:52,719 --> 00:45:57,319
Speaker 1: my latest records are later than your latest rick. There's

794
00:45:57,520 --> 00:46:00,520
Speaker 1: a specific type of radar that has been used for

795
00:46:00,600 --> 00:46:05,120
Speaker 1: some storm tracking technology. It's called smart R, which is

796
00:46:05,160 --> 00:46:09,880
Speaker 1: again yet another acronym stands for Shared Mobile Atmospheric Research

797
00:46:09,920 --> 00:46:13,719
Speaker 1: and Teaching Radar. This is one that is mainly used

798
00:46:13,719 --> 00:46:16,799
Speaker 1: for research. It's used both for hurricanes and for tornadoes

799
00:46:17,360 --> 00:46:22,080
Speaker 1: and UM. So you know that this combination of technology

800
00:46:22,160 --> 00:46:25,400
Speaker 1: is used to really get as much information about strength

801
00:46:25,400 --> 00:46:27,600
Speaker 1: and speed as we possibly can so that we can

802
00:46:27,640 --> 00:46:30,760
Speaker 1: add to our body of knowledge. UM. And then there's

803
00:46:30,800 --> 00:46:35,080
Speaker 1: some private chase teams and tours that have marine radars

804
00:46:35,120 --> 00:46:39,719
Speaker 1: mounted on their vehicles. However, you should know this is decoration.

805
00:46:40,480 --> 00:46:44,080
Speaker 1: Marine radars are useless when it comes to storm chasing

806
00:46:44,080 --> 00:46:48,200
Speaker 1: and storm tracking. It's promotional purposes only they're not used

807
00:46:48,239 --> 00:46:53,200
Speaker 1: in research. Um and actually marine radar signals can interfere

808
00:46:53,320 --> 00:46:58,640
Speaker 1: with research units like DOWS, so don't do it. Storm

809
00:46:58,719 --> 00:47:02,120
Speaker 1: chasing companies, don't put marine radar on your trucks and

810
00:47:02,160 --> 00:47:04,879
Speaker 1: then use them. Yeah, that's pretty silly. There are some

811
00:47:04,920 --> 00:47:09,440
Speaker 1: projects that have been very interesting but not very successful.

812
00:47:10,080 --> 00:47:13,440
Speaker 1: Uh Toto is one of my favorites. TOTO standing for

813
00:47:13,560 --> 00:47:17,080
Speaker 1: Total bal Tornado Observatory. Now TOTO, of course, is also

814
00:47:17,280 --> 00:47:23,680
Speaker 1: obviously a reference to that fantastic documentary about a tourist

815
00:47:23,719 --> 00:47:28,359
Speaker 1: from Kansas who visits a an exotic land and UH

816
00:47:28,760 --> 00:47:32,320
Speaker 1: kills the one of the leaders of that land. Them. Actually,

817
00:47:32,600 --> 00:47:37,120
Speaker 1: Total was developed by Dr Allen Bettard and Carl Ramsey

818
00:47:37,239 --> 00:47:40,759
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy nine, first deployed by them in Night One,

819
00:47:41,239 --> 00:47:45,160
Speaker 1: and basically it was an oil drum of like a

820
00:47:45,200 --> 00:47:48,480
Speaker 1: fifty five gallon oil drum with some stuff in it,

821
00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:51,600
Speaker 1: with some instruments in it. The idea that the tornado

822
00:47:51,640 --> 00:47:54,120
Speaker 1: would pick this drum up and we would gather the

823
00:47:54,120 --> 00:47:57,040
Speaker 1: information from the instruments inside, and hopefully the drum would

824
00:47:57,040 --> 00:48:01,640
Speaker 1: protect the instruments so that the information would usable. Right, So,

825
00:48:01,800 --> 00:48:05,040
Speaker 1: how did that work out? Well? Um, it weighed four

826
00:48:05,120 --> 00:48:09,399
Speaker 1: hundred pounds, which is as or so and so not

827
00:48:09,520 --> 00:48:11,640
Speaker 1: actually very well. I mean, first of all, you know

828
00:48:11,680 --> 00:48:15,040
Speaker 1: they were working in the early eighties when UH, we

829
00:48:15,160 --> 00:48:17,799
Speaker 1: did not have the kind of communication technology that it

830
00:48:17,800 --> 00:48:21,920
Speaker 1: would allow people to really effectively chase storms. So it

831
00:48:22,000 --> 00:48:23,840
Speaker 1: was it was it was pretty much a crapshoot of

832
00:48:23,840 --> 00:48:25,920
Speaker 1: whether or not they would leave this thing in a

833
00:48:25,960 --> 00:48:29,200
Speaker 1: place that would were likely to get picked up right.

834
00:48:29,680 --> 00:48:31,600
Speaker 1: Keep in mind, they don't have the benefit of a

835
00:48:31,680 --> 00:48:36,919
Speaker 1: laptop with WiFi in so they have radio. They could

836
00:48:36,920 --> 00:48:39,799
Speaker 1: have radio, so they could they could get radio updates.

837
00:48:39,840 --> 00:48:42,759
Speaker 1: But without the ability to actually track a storm on

838
00:48:42,800 --> 00:48:45,800
Speaker 1: a computer and see it and be able to anticipate

839
00:48:45,800 --> 00:48:48,160
Speaker 1: where it's going to move, it made it much more

840
00:48:48,160 --> 00:48:50,120
Speaker 1: difficult to get to the right place at the right time.

841
00:48:50,400 --> 00:48:52,680
Speaker 1: Sure Also, it took thirty seconds to deploy from the

842
00:48:52,719 --> 00:48:56,000
Speaker 1: back of a of a specially created truck um which

843
00:48:56,120 --> 00:48:58,680
Speaker 1: is which sounds like a short period of time, but

844
00:48:58,680 --> 00:49:01,920
Speaker 1: but that is tremendously long when a tornado is bearing

845
00:49:01,960 --> 00:49:04,840
Speaker 1: down on you. Yeah, or if you're anticipating a tornado,

846
00:49:04,880 --> 00:49:06,919
Speaker 1: keep in mind we're talking about that wall cloud, which

847
00:49:06,960 --> 00:49:09,040
Speaker 1: was the indicator that a tornado could touch down within

848
00:49:09,080 --> 00:49:10,839
Speaker 1: ten to twenty minutes. If it takes you half an

849
00:49:10,840 --> 00:49:13,920
Speaker 1: hour to unpack your equipment, just finding out where the

850
00:49:13,920 --> 00:49:17,879
Speaker 1: tornado might touch down and then getting the equipment out

851
00:49:17,960 --> 00:49:19,680
Speaker 1: and set on the ground, first of all, it may

852
00:49:19,719 --> 00:49:22,160
Speaker 1: be too late, maybe that the tornado has touched down

853
00:49:22,160 --> 00:49:24,520
Speaker 1: while you were trying to get your your equipment out,

854
00:49:24,520 --> 00:49:27,919
Speaker 1: in which case you may be in serious danger or things.

855
00:49:28,080 --> 00:49:30,520
Speaker 1: Conditions could have changed to the point where the place

856
00:49:30,560 --> 00:49:33,280
Speaker 1: where you thought was the perfect spot is no longer

857
00:49:33,320 --> 00:49:36,200
Speaker 1: anywhere close to where the tornado may touch down. So

858
00:49:37,040 --> 00:49:40,239
Speaker 1: it was very difficult. It as a surprise to no one.

859
00:49:40,280 --> 00:49:42,640
Speaker 1: It was never really picked up by a tornado. Uh. No,

860
00:49:42,760 --> 00:49:45,800
Speaker 1: it did it. A tornado did run over it once

861
00:49:46,000 --> 00:49:52,160
Speaker 1: in UM when the n SSL had had taken over

862
00:49:52,640 --> 00:49:55,600
Speaker 1: for it, and um, mostly the tornado just knocked it

863
00:49:55,640 --> 00:49:59,320
Speaker 1: over and damaged the instruments. Yeah so, but then it

864
00:49:59,480 --> 00:50:04,000
Speaker 1: served as inspiration for another uh, fictional device, didn't Yes,

865
00:50:04,000 --> 00:50:09,080
Speaker 1: it did. Toto was the inspiration for Dorothy, which was

866
00:50:09,160 --> 00:50:12,680
Speaker 1: the fictional device in the film Twister. Yeah, so the

867
00:50:13,000 --> 00:50:15,160
Speaker 1: movie that made us believe that a cow could be

868
00:50:15,200 --> 00:50:18,320
Speaker 1: picked up by a tornado and still be perfectly cow like,

869
00:50:19,080 --> 00:50:21,560
Speaker 1: were willing to move at any rate. Yeah, and and

870
00:50:21,640 --> 00:50:26,480
Speaker 1: not turned into hamburger. Um, Yeah it was. Uh. Dorothy

871
00:50:26,560 --> 00:50:28,880
Speaker 1: was the name of the device they wanted to deploy

872
00:50:29,040 --> 00:50:30,759
Speaker 1: in the film and try and get it in the

873
00:50:30,760 --> 00:50:33,000
Speaker 1: path of the tornado. It was inspired by the real

874
00:50:33,040 --> 00:50:40,800
Speaker 1: world analog Toto in in reality, Toto was scrapped in UM.

875
00:50:40,840 --> 00:50:44,000
Speaker 1: But yeah, however, there are many other instruments that have

876
00:50:44,120 --> 00:50:48,040
Speaker 1: been created for similar purposes. UM One is called a turtle,

877
00:50:48,680 --> 00:50:52,080
Speaker 1: which is a kind of hub cap looking little devices

878
00:50:52,160 --> 00:50:55,720
Speaker 1: that are They were debuted, I believe in nineteen eighties six,

879
00:50:55,920 --> 00:51:00,200
Speaker 1: and we're we're on that beginning edge of digital technology there.

880
00:51:00,320 --> 00:51:02,359
Speaker 1: They were not meant to be picked up. They were

881
00:51:02,360 --> 00:51:07,239
Speaker 1: actually designed as heavy, squat and aerodynamic, the idea being

882
00:51:07,239 --> 00:51:11,279
Speaker 1: that they could withstand the wind forces of a tornado

883
00:51:11,360 --> 00:51:13,120
Speaker 1: so that you could retrieve them and find out all

884
00:51:13,160 --> 00:51:16,520
Speaker 1: the information you needed, things like temperature, pressure, humidity, and

885
00:51:17,120 --> 00:51:21,520
Speaker 1: not just get picked up like the like Toto was.

886
00:51:21,600 --> 00:51:23,160
Speaker 1: It was just meant to be there so that you

887
00:51:23,200 --> 00:51:26,200
Speaker 1: can recover it afterward the tornado had passed through. There

888
00:51:26,200 --> 00:51:28,759
Speaker 1: are also snails which are similar in appearance, but are

889
00:51:28,840 --> 00:51:33,280
Speaker 1: outfitted with these seismic sensors because there was a theory

890
00:51:33,320 --> 00:51:36,719
Speaker 1: at some point that UM, if we can study the

891
00:51:37,000 --> 00:51:41,040
Speaker 1: vibrations that tornadoes create in the ground, that we would

892
00:51:41,040 --> 00:51:44,719
Speaker 1: be able to learn new fund stuff about them. Interesting,

893
00:51:45,320 --> 00:51:48,239
Speaker 1: I had not heard about that. UM also dellocams and

894
00:51:48,520 --> 00:51:53,680
Speaker 1: observation zero O Z s Ozes Okay, I just I

895
00:51:53,760 --> 00:51:57,359
Speaker 1: just got that. I'm sorry, Dorothy Toto and Oz right, Um,

896
00:51:57,520 --> 00:52:01,200
Speaker 1: which are which are camera equipment that that has been

897
00:52:01,239 --> 00:52:03,640
Speaker 1: designed to be put in the place, And I totally

898
00:52:03,680 --> 00:52:06,279
Speaker 1: forgot to write down. There's also munchkins, because, as it

899
00:52:06,320 --> 00:52:09,360
Speaker 1: turns out, storm chasers get hungry and occasionally stop at

900
00:52:09,440 --> 00:52:11,959
Speaker 1: Dunkin Donuts and they just order a bunch of those

901
00:52:11,960 --> 00:52:14,320
Speaker 1: to eat while they're waiting. I just figured that we

902
00:52:14,400 --> 00:52:16,040
Speaker 1: might as well keep on going down this Wizard of

903
00:52:16,040 --> 00:52:19,560
Speaker 1: Oz route. So what about armored vehicles? Yeah, oh okay,

904
00:52:19,600 --> 00:52:23,719
Speaker 1: so you're talking about the TIV. Yes, the Tornado intercept vehicle. Uh,

905
00:52:23,760 --> 00:52:27,000
Speaker 1: there's actually been a couple of these, um and in fact,

906
00:52:27,239 --> 00:52:30,520
Speaker 1: there well, tornado intercept vehicle is kind of a generic

907
00:52:30,600 --> 00:52:32,439
Speaker 1: name at this time. At this point, you're really talking

908
00:52:32,480 --> 00:52:36,160
Speaker 1: about any kind of reinforced vehicle, but specifically we're talking

909
00:52:36,160 --> 00:52:39,120
Speaker 1: about essentially, you take you take a pretty heavy vehicle,

910
00:52:39,320 --> 00:52:42,360
Speaker 1: one that's already pretty rugged, and then you turn it

911
00:52:42,400 --> 00:52:49,080
Speaker 1: into a reinforced possibly armor plated, uh possibly augmented vehicle,

912
00:52:49,320 --> 00:52:52,040
Speaker 1: something that looks like it came out of Mad Max. Yeah. Yeah,

913
00:52:52,080 --> 00:52:55,319
Speaker 1: you might be wondering, you know who rules Bartertown by

914
00:52:55,320 --> 00:52:58,239
Speaker 1: the time you see one of these things. Uh, they

915
00:52:58,320 --> 00:53:03,760
Speaker 1: are meant to withstand high winds, speeds, hail, massive, massive trauma.

916
00:53:04,239 --> 00:53:07,759
Speaker 1: They're reinforced and sometimes they have hydraulic panels that can

917
00:53:07,800 --> 00:53:10,440
Speaker 1: actually extend down to the sides of the vehicle. The

918
00:53:10,520 --> 00:53:14,120
Speaker 1: idea being that if you extend the hydraulic panel so

919
00:53:14,160 --> 00:53:17,480
Speaker 1: that it goes from the ground and and leaves no

920
00:53:17,680 --> 00:53:21,320
Speaker 1: space under the vehicle, then you can't have wind sweeping

921
00:53:21,520 --> 00:53:24,920
Speaker 1: underneath the vehicle and and lift it off or push

922
00:53:24,960 --> 00:53:28,680
Speaker 1: it off. It's it's perch, right um. Some of them

923
00:53:28,760 --> 00:53:32,680
Speaker 1: even have stabilizing jacks that will that will extend down

924
00:53:32,719 --> 00:53:35,839
Speaker 1: and into the ground and stable again, stabilize this so

925
00:53:35,880 --> 00:53:38,680
Speaker 1: that when heavy wind hits it, it doesn't rock over

926
00:53:38,760 --> 00:53:41,680
Speaker 1: and and tilt over and fall off right um. The

927
00:53:41,719 --> 00:53:46,080
Speaker 1: tip too specifically was was was one that was created

928
00:53:46,120 --> 00:53:49,360
Speaker 1: that weighed about eight tons. Yeah, that's a pretty hefty vehicle.

929
00:53:49,400 --> 00:53:53,320
Speaker 1: It also usually has has windows designed so that someone

930
00:53:53,400 --> 00:53:56,600
Speaker 1: with a camera can get as many different angles as possible.

931
00:53:56,760 --> 00:53:59,760
Speaker 1: The the the original was created by one Sean Casey,

932
00:53:59,800 --> 00:54:03,080
Speaker 1: who is an Imax cinematographer who was working towards some

933
00:54:03,080 --> 00:54:06,160
Speaker 1: some documentary pieces. I remember seeing bits from that, I

934
00:54:06,200 --> 00:54:09,600
Speaker 1: never got to see the full I assume they eventually

935
00:54:09,680 --> 00:54:13,000
Speaker 1: had a more probably more than one documentary based on this,

936
00:54:13,040 --> 00:54:15,040
Speaker 1: But I do remember seeing excerpts of this and they

937
00:54:15,040 --> 00:54:19,919
Speaker 1: were pretty fantastic. I also remember, uh seeing at least

938
00:54:20,000 --> 00:54:23,240
Speaker 1: one clip where the crew was concerned that his desire

939
00:54:23,320 --> 00:54:29,160
Speaker 1: to get the best footage was possibly a little reckless.

940
00:54:29,560 --> 00:54:31,239
Speaker 1: That's probably the best way for me to put it,

941
00:54:31,760 --> 00:54:34,520
Speaker 1: and I have no doubt that that that could be

942
00:54:34,520 --> 00:54:36,759
Speaker 1: a thing that could have happened. Well, what kind of

943
00:54:36,760 --> 00:54:42,680
Speaker 1: information have storm chasers gathered? Mainly we're talking about atmospheric conditions,

944
00:54:42,760 --> 00:54:46,080
Speaker 1: things like the rotation of the clouds, getting more information

945
00:54:46,120 --> 00:54:49,160
Speaker 1: about that, more information about the actual sequence of events

946
00:54:49,200 --> 00:54:52,040
Speaker 1: that leads up to tornado formation, the behavior of the

947
00:54:52,080 --> 00:54:56,600
Speaker 1: tornadoes themselves, the strength of the tornado. Uh, the you know,

948
00:54:56,880 --> 00:55:00,640
Speaker 1: We've got some information about barometric pressure, some things about temperature,

949
00:55:01,360 --> 00:55:04,359
Speaker 1: wind speeds and all this kind of stuff. Humidity. It's

950
00:55:04,400 --> 00:55:07,880
Speaker 1: really just trying to get as much data as possible

951
00:55:07,920 --> 00:55:10,839
Speaker 1: and sift through it to learn what is it that

952
00:55:10,920 --> 00:55:14,000
Speaker 1: really makes these things happen? Right, Because some of the

953
00:55:14,080 --> 00:55:16,279
Speaker 1: leading theories for a long time had a lot to

954
00:55:16,320 --> 00:55:20,040
Speaker 1: do with um with temperature differences right up until we

955
00:55:20,160 --> 00:55:22,880
Speaker 1: got some data in from tornadoes. That said that temperature

956
00:55:22,880 --> 00:55:26,080
Speaker 1: differences in in in airflow do not have to exist

957
00:55:26,120 --> 00:55:28,520
Speaker 1: for a tornado to be created, right, doesn't have That's

958
00:55:28,520 --> 00:55:32,360
Speaker 1: not not a not a necessary factor, right, And so

959
00:55:32,719 --> 00:55:34,480
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's it's kind of one of those

960
00:55:34,480 --> 00:55:36,280
Speaker 1: things where the more we learn, the more we realize

961
00:55:36,320 --> 00:55:38,280
Speaker 1: that we have to learn. And it is so difficult

962
00:55:38,320 --> 00:55:41,200
Speaker 1: to get good readings. Yeah, yeah, we will because it's

963
00:55:41,200 --> 00:55:43,759
Speaker 1: so dangerous. Yeah, we're talking about such huge forces here

964
00:55:43,800 --> 00:55:47,759
Speaker 1: that getting a good reading is just, uh, it's risky

965
00:55:47,800 --> 00:55:50,080
Speaker 1: and a lot of the stuff we've developed just can't

966
00:55:50,280 --> 00:55:52,880
Speaker 1: live up, can't hold up to those kind of forces.

967
00:55:53,760 --> 00:55:56,720
Speaker 1: It can, as we said, be very financially viable. Um

968
00:55:57,040 --> 00:56:00,120
Speaker 1: one war in Fadely is a kind of rocks our

969
00:56:00,200 --> 00:56:03,439
Speaker 1: storm chaser whose photos of storms can sell for over

970
00:56:03,560 --> 00:56:07,319
Speaker 1: ten thous dollars a piece, Yeah, which has inspired a

971
00:56:07,320 --> 00:56:10,040
Speaker 1: lot of people to try and follow in his footsteps.

972
00:56:10,360 --> 00:56:13,239
Speaker 1: In fact, that's one of the big controversies, and we

973
00:56:13,280 --> 00:56:15,880
Speaker 1: can go ahead and move into the controversy of storm chasing.

974
00:56:16,200 --> 00:56:21,160
Speaker 1: One of them is that with documentaries with reality television,

975
00:56:21,320 --> 00:56:23,600
Speaker 1: I mean we do have storm chasers on Discovery. We've

976
00:56:23,600 --> 00:56:26,360
Speaker 1: got or we had I believe it was. It was

977
00:56:26,480 --> 00:56:30,279
Speaker 1: ended in two Yeah. So, But but there's been some

978
00:56:30,320 --> 00:56:34,480
Speaker 1: controversy that these sort of things have inspired lots and

979
00:56:34,520 --> 00:56:37,240
Speaker 1: lots of people to either pursue it as a hobby

980
00:56:37,400 --> 00:56:40,160
Speaker 1: or go into the tourism trade, that sort of stuff,

981
00:56:40,760 --> 00:56:44,920
Speaker 1: and that that itself can add to the already significant

982
00:56:45,000 --> 00:56:48,719
Speaker 1: danger of storm chasing for research purposes or even as

983
00:56:48,719 --> 00:56:51,359
Speaker 1: a profession especially considering the fact that if you've got

984
00:56:51,840 --> 00:56:54,399
Speaker 1: if you do have research professionals who are out there

985
00:56:54,440 --> 00:56:58,000
Speaker 1: trying to be safe, and you get in their way

986
00:56:58,320 --> 00:57:00,800
Speaker 1: bad times for everybody you can, you can cause traffic

987
00:57:00,880 --> 00:57:04,720
Speaker 1: jams right when people need to have an open escape

988
00:57:04,800 --> 00:57:08,480
Speaker 1: route in case the storm changes dramatically, and that can happen.

989
00:57:08,680 --> 00:57:12,000
Speaker 1: Storm storms can travel in one direction and then suddenly

990
00:57:12,160 --> 00:57:14,880
Speaker 1: veer off, and you need to be nimble enough to

991
00:57:14,920 --> 00:57:16,560
Speaker 1: be able to respond to that. But if you've got

992
00:57:17,160 --> 00:57:19,560
Speaker 1: a line of cars behind you and that's the only

993
00:57:19,600 --> 00:57:22,200
Speaker 1: way out, then you're kind of stuck. It also means

994
00:57:22,320 --> 00:57:25,920
Speaker 1: adding the danger of first responders needing to get to

995
00:57:26,160 --> 00:57:29,960
Speaker 1: locations after a tornado has passed through. So it's one

996
00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:33,960
Speaker 1: of those things that has raised some concerns because legally speaking,

997
00:57:34,000 --> 00:57:38,360
Speaker 1: there are no rules or laws regarding storm chasing, apart

998
00:57:38,440 --> 00:57:42,320
Speaker 1: from obeying traffic laws and things like trespassing. Clearly, you

999
00:57:42,560 --> 00:57:45,400
Speaker 1: are not supposed to trespass on people's property. You aren't

1000
00:57:45,400 --> 00:57:48,400
Speaker 1: supposed to, uh, you know, drive the wrong way down

1001
00:57:48,520 --> 00:57:51,640
Speaker 1: the street, that kind of stuff. But beyond that, there's

1002
00:57:51,680 --> 00:57:55,720
Speaker 1: not really anything. You know, there's nothing illegal about storm chasing,

1003
00:57:55,920 --> 00:57:59,400
Speaker 1: but there have been some discussions about that. UM and

1004
00:57:59,400 --> 00:58:02,480
Speaker 1: then twenty team we had a tragedy in which three

1005
00:58:02,600 --> 00:58:07,720
Speaker 1: storm chasers, famous ones Tim Samaras, Paul samarrass Son and

1006
00:58:07,800 --> 00:58:12,880
Speaker 1: Carl Young Uh they died in h an accident. They

1007
00:58:12,880 --> 00:58:16,280
Speaker 1: were caught in a tornado near El Reno, Oklahoma. This

1008
00:58:16,360 --> 00:58:18,840
Speaker 1: was on May thirty one, and Endy they had been

1009
00:58:18,920 --> 00:58:23,520
Speaker 1: part of the Discovery show storm Chasers. Full full disclosure,

1010
00:58:23,680 --> 00:58:25,920
Speaker 1: Full disclosure. We are house Works as a part of

1011
00:58:26,000 --> 00:58:29,240
Speaker 1: daughter company Discovery. Now we should also say that that

1012
00:58:29,720 --> 00:58:33,080
Speaker 1: they were experienced storm chasers, and they were. They were

1013
00:58:33,240 --> 00:58:37,080
Speaker 1: widely regarded as responsible members of the community, and they

1014
00:58:37,120 --> 00:58:42,040
Speaker 1: had provided quite a bit of scientific research. Absolutely, Tim

1015
00:58:42,040 --> 00:58:45,720
Speaker 1: in fact founded twist Decks, which which is similar to Vortex.

1016
00:58:45,760 --> 00:58:49,720
Speaker 1: It's it's an acronym for the tactical weather instrumented sampling

1017
00:58:49,720 --> 00:58:54,800
Speaker 1: in Tornado's experiment. Yeah, he had an engineering background, uh,

1018
00:58:54,840 --> 00:58:58,520
Speaker 1: and he successfully deployed a turtle that recorded the barometric

1019
00:58:58,600 --> 00:59:02,080
Speaker 1: pressure of two different tornadoes. One in two thousand three

1020
00:59:02,200 --> 00:59:06,000
Speaker 1: recorded a barometric drop in pressure of forty milli bars

1021
00:59:06,040 --> 00:59:08,760
Speaker 1: and another one another probe recorded a one d milli

1022
00:59:08,880 --> 00:59:13,080
Speaker 1: bar drop in a violent tornado in South Dakota. UM.

1023
00:59:13,200 --> 00:59:17,360
Speaker 1: Later on, other turtles would record more baro metic pressure,

1024
00:59:17,400 --> 00:59:19,800
Speaker 1: but his was the first one to do that. So

1025
00:59:19,840 --> 00:59:24,400
Speaker 1: he was really contributing to the scientific knowledge of tornadoes.

1026
00:59:24,560 --> 00:59:29,800
Speaker 1: And so Uh. Their deaths were very tragic obviously, and

1027
00:59:29,880 --> 00:59:35,800
Speaker 1: also raised up a conversation about is storm chasing something responsible?

1028
00:59:35,920 --> 00:59:40,439
Speaker 1: Is it okay, should be for other things, for for

1029
00:59:40,440 --> 00:59:45,200
Speaker 1: for non humans to collect the data, and and you know,

1030
00:59:45,280 --> 00:59:47,400
Speaker 1: it's one of those things again where there's there's not

1031
00:59:47,480 --> 00:59:50,920
Speaker 1: been any official movement as far as I'm aware, but

1032
00:59:51,960 --> 00:59:56,600
Speaker 1: people like the Kansas Emergency Management Association president Brian Stone

1033
00:59:56,640 --> 00:59:59,160
Speaker 1: said it was worth looking into establishing at least some

1034
00:59:59,360 --> 01:00:04,080
Speaker 1: rules to guide storm chasers, if not formal laws, at

1035
01:00:04,160 --> 01:00:08,920
Speaker 1: least uh kind of a code really that storm chasers

1036
01:00:08,960 --> 01:00:12,720
Speaker 1: need to follow. Now, keep in mind Tim Samaras and

1037
01:00:12,800 --> 01:00:16,240
Speaker 1: his crew were experts. I mean they were they were

1038
01:00:16,320 --> 01:00:20,640
Speaker 1: known for being very safety conscious. So this really shows

1039
01:00:20,720 --> 01:00:23,840
Speaker 1: how unpredictable these storms can be. And even if you

1040
01:00:23,880 --> 01:00:26,040
Speaker 1: are at the top of your game and you are

1041
01:00:26,280 --> 01:00:31,560
Speaker 1: very careful, tragedy can strike. Yeah. Supposedly the storm that

1042
01:00:31,560 --> 01:00:34,880
Speaker 1: that they were killed and killed another ten people out

1043
01:00:34,880 --> 01:00:39,000
Speaker 1: in Oklahoma and supposedly had one of those very quick

1044
01:00:39,040 --> 01:00:42,120
Speaker 1: turns that no one could have predicted. They probably blocked

1045
01:00:42,120 --> 01:00:44,960
Speaker 1: their escape routes. And the National Weather Service does not

1046
01:00:45,240 --> 01:00:49,120
Speaker 1: endorse storm chasing because of the risk involved. However, they

1047
01:00:49,160 --> 01:00:52,800
Speaker 1: do welcome the reports that storm chasers bring in. So

1048
01:00:52,920 --> 01:00:54,640
Speaker 1: it's kind of you know, it's one of those things

1049
01:00:54,680 --> 01:00:57,600
Speaker 1: where they say, yeah, we can't we can't say go

1050
01:00:57,640 --> 01:00:59,560
Speaker 1: out and be a storm chaser, but we will say

1051
01:00:59,600 --> 01:01:03,000
Speaker 1: that the do we get is invaluable. Yes, we can't

1052
01:01:03,040 --> 01:01:06,360
Speaker 1: put a price tag on that because it's it's helping

1053
01:01:06,440 --> 01:01:10,880
Speaker 1: us understand the systems and that's really the best way

1054
01:01:10,920 --> 01:01:13,600
Speaker 1: we know of doing it. And through sky Warn, in fact,

1055
01:01:13,640 --> 01:01:17,360
Speaker 1: they will conduct spot or training classes across the United States.

1056
01:01:17,400 --> 01:01:20,280
Speaker 1: If you're if you are very interested in storm chasing,

1057
01:01:20,280 --> 01:01:22,840
Speaker 1: I would recommend not probably going on one of the

1058
01:01:22,920 --> 01:01:28,600
Speaker 1: tours I don't think they're necessarily responsible, but um, you can't.

1059
01:01:28,640 --> 01:01:31,320
Speaker 1: You know, some may be very good at following safety

1060
01:01:31,520 --> 01:01:35,440
Speaker 1: rules and some maybe a little more lax in that.

1061
01:01:35,600 --> 01:01:37,360
Speaker 1: It's hard to say. It's hard to say, but but

1062
01:01:37,480 --> 01:01:42,280
Speaker 1: Sky Warren will Um will train you up. You can

1063
01:01:42,320 --> 01:01:44,720
Speaker 1: do it. You can do this in the most responsible

1064
01:01:44,880 --> 01:01:48,560
Speaker 1: and safe way possible, which is that's the best thing.

1065
01:01:48,600 --> 01:01:50,360
Speaker 1: I mean, this is your passion, and this is you

1066
01:01:50,400 --> 01:01:53,240
Speaker 1: want to contribute to the scientific knowledge. I mean, I

1067
01:01:53,280 --> 01:01:56,400
Speaker 1: find that admirable. I personally also think it's crazy because

1068
01:01:56,400 --> 01:01:58,800
Speaker 1: I I've know well well, like I said, Lauren, and

1069
01:01:58,800 --> 01:02:01,000
Speaker 1: I can talk a little bit about our experience living

1070
01:02:01,000 --> 01:02:04,320
Speaker 1: through tornadoes. Uh, and I would never ever ever want

1071
01:02:04,360 --> 01:02:07,040
Speaker 1: to invite that experience on me again if I can

1072
01:02:07,080 --> 01:02:10,480
Speaker 1: avoid it. What what? What? What did happen? Okay, alright,

1073
01:02:10,520 --> 01:02:13,440
Speaker 1: well I can talk about that. So. I grew up

1074
01:02:13,480 --> 01:02:17,160
Speaker 1: in northeast Georgia, near a city called Gainesville, which actually

1075
01:02:17,160 --> 01:02:20,680
Speaker 1: has a history of tornado problems. There was a tornado

1076
01:02:20,760 --> 01:02:24,920
Speaker 1: that moved through early in the twentieth century and laid

1077
01:02:24,960 --> 01:02:28,480
Speaker 1: the city to waste. I mean, it completely destroyed Gainesville.

1078
01:02:28,920 --> 01:02:32,640
Speaker 1: My grandfather worked in a textile mill in New Holland, Georgia,

1079
01:02:32,680 --> 01:02:36,640
Speaker 1: which is just outside of Gainesville. And uh, he tells

1080
01:02:36,880 --> 01:02:39,280
Speaker 1: or he told the story. He's passed on now, but

1081
01:02:39,320 --> 01:02:42,320
Speaker 1: he told a story about how working in the mill

1082
01:02:42,640 --> 01:02:44,840
Speaker 1: he was, you know, the tornado was bearing down the

1083
01:02:44,880 --> 01:02:48,040
Speaker 1: mill and he was moving toward the staircase to get

1084
01:02:48,160 --> 01:02:50,600
Speaker 1: down to a safe level, and as he was hitting

1085
01:02:50,600 --> 01:02:54,080
Speaker 1: the staircase, the roof of the building ripped off because

1086
01:02:54,120 --> 01:02:57,480
Speaker 1: of this tornado, the force of this wind. And uh,

1087
01:02:57,720 --> 01:03:01,280
Speaker 1: this was the same tornado that essentially level the city.

1088
01:03:01,600 --> 01:03:04,160
Speaker 1: When I was growing up, we had several tornadoes passed

1089
01:03:04,200 --> 01:03:07,240
Speaker 1: over the area of town I lived in, which is

1090
01:03:07,240 --> 01:03:11,360
Speaker 1: called Oakwood, Georgia. I grew up there, and uh, I

1091
01:03:11,400 --> 01:03:15,480
Speaker 1: can remember like there were there were houses that were

1092
01:03:15,520 --> 01:03:18,479
Speaker 1: within just a very short walk, like you just walked

1093
01:03:18,560 --> 01:03:20,280
Speaker 1: up a hill and you could see them that were

1094
01:03:20,320 --> 01:03:23,800
Speaker 1: completely leveled by tornadoes on a couple of occasions. And

1095
01:03:23,920 --> 01:03:27,120
Speaker 1: I mean I remember huddling with my family at the

1096
01:03:27,160 --> 01:03:31,920
Speaker 1: base of our house. Um, you know, not even sure

1097
01:03:31,960 --> 01:03:34,600
Speaker 1: if our house was going to be hit by these things.

1098
01:03:35,160 --> 01:03:38,720
Speaker 1: And uh, we had tornadoes passed directly over us where

1099
01:03:38,760 --> 01:03:41,400
Speaker 1: you know, sometimes a tornado will touch down and then

1100
01:03:41,480 --> 01:03:43,880
Speaker 1: lift up and touch down again. In fact, there's even

1101
01:03:43,960 --> 01:03:46,480
Speaker 1: argument about whether or not that counts as two separate

1102
01:03:46,480 --> 01:03:50,120
Speaker 1: tornadoes or the same one. We've had that happened where

1103
01:03:50,120 --> 01:03:54,320
Speaker 1: a tornado went directly over our house, where it lifted

1104
01:03:54,360 --> 01:03:56,520
Speaker 1: up and then set back down a little bit further out.

1105
01:03:57,160 --> 01:04:00,480
Speaker 1: So um, you know, as a kid, that was definitely

1106
01:04:00,520 --> 01:04:02,720
Speaker 1: like that was a life defining experience to the point

1107
01:04:02,720 --> 01:04:05,720
Speaker 1: where I had trouble with storms for a while after

1108
01:04:05,800 --> 01:04:08,680
Speaker 1: I was after that. These days, storms don't bother me

1109
01:04:08,760 --> 01:04:11,200
Speaker 1: so much. I can. I can handle that just fine.

1110
01:04:11,560 --> 01:04:14,440
Speaker 1: But if it starts turning like ominous, if I start

1111
01:04:14,600 --> 01:04:19,320
Speaker 1: noticing those little warning signs, I take cover because it

1112
01:04:19,480 --> 01:04:22,720
Speaker 1: is serious business. I mean, it is absolutely terrifying to

1113
01:04:22,760 --> 01:04:26,160
Speaker 1: live through. Sure, yeah, I am. My My experience is

1114
01:04:26,160 --> 01:04:29,000
Speaker 1: a lot more spotty than that. I remember being maybe

1115
01:04:29,160 --> 01:04:31,760
Speaker 1: maybe about five years old, and my my mother and

1116
01:04:32,120 --> 01:04:36,920
Speaker 1: U are extremely dedicated black Labrador retriever UM hurting me

1117
01:04:37,200 --> 01:04:41,280
Speaker 1: down into the basement. And uh, but I think that

1118
01:04:41,400 --> 01:04:44,000
Speaker 1: mostly by the time we got there, like by the

1119
01:04:44,000 --> 01:04:46,560
Speaker 1: time we heard about it and got down there, the

1120
01:04:46,640 --> 01:04:50,760
Speaker 1: radio was already calling it off. Um. And and this

1121
01:04:50,840 --> 01:04:53,080
Speaker 1: is the to the two types of warnings that you

1122
01:04:53,120 --> 01:04:54,920
Speaker 1: may have heard of and had a tiny bit of

1123
01:04:54,960 --> 01:04:57,880
Speaker 1: confusion about because I don't feel like they're very well

1124
01:04:57,920 --> 01:05:01,520
Speaker 1: publicized the differences, but between them all the time. Tornado

1125
01:05:01,600 --> 01:05:05,440
Speaker 1: watch is issued by the n o A a UH

1126
01:05:05,560 --> 01:05:09,919
Speaker 1: Storm Prediction Center meteorologists and and they are watching the

1127
01:05:10,120 --> 01:05:14,960
Speaker 1: entire United States all the time. UM. Tornado warning, however,

1128
01:05:15,160 --> 01:05:18,640
Speaker 1: is issued by a local n o A a UH

1129
01:05:18,840 --> 01:05:22,920
Speaker 1: National Weather Service forecast office who is watching your designated

1130
01:05:22,960 --> 01:05:26,520
Speaker 1: area all the time and UH. The warning indicates that

1131
01:05:26,560 --> 01:05:30,320
Speaker 1: there are spotters who have seen a touchdown and then

1132
01:05:30,360 --> 01:05:32,640
Speaker 1: you need to get to safety. The the the watch

1133
01:05:32,800 --> 01:05:36,400
Speaker 1: is more that there are conditions that are favorable for

1134
01:05:36,680 --> 01:05:42,000
Speaker 1: a tornado. A tornado could could form under such conditions. Yeah,

1135
01:05:42,040 --> 01:05:46,160
Speaker 1: I've seen so many of both. Um. It's one of

1136
01:05:46,160 --> 01:05:49,440
Speaker 1: the one of the risks of living in the Southeast

1137
01:05:49,520 --> 01:05:52,920
Speaker 1: United States. Not again, not nearly as prone to tornadoes

1138
01:05:52,960 --> 01:05:55,280
Speaker 1: as other parts in the nation, which can get them

1139
01:05:55,320 --> 01:05:58,320
Speaker 1: even more regularly than we do. And I thought i'd

1140
01:05:58,320 --> 01:06:01,520
Speaker 1: close out this is something that another storm chaser had

1141
01:06:01,560 --> 01:06:05,560
Speaker 1: said about the situation with with Tim Samaras and his

1142
01:06:05,640 --> 01:06:10,320
Speaker 1: son Paul and Carl Young. His name is Renny vander Wedge,

1143
01:06:10,480 --> 01:06:13,760
Speaker 1: and I apologize if I have butchered that name, but

1144
01:06:13,880 --> 01:06:15,680
Speaker 1: he had this to say, and I thought it was interesting.

1145
01:06:15,800 --> 01:06:18,400
Speaker 1: There's actually quite a bit that he has written about

1146
01:06:18,520 --> 01:06:21,000
Speaker 1: the storm chasing in general, but I thought this, this

1147
01:06:21,080 --> 01:06:25,520
Speaker 1: really bears attention in our podcast. So he said, many

1148
01:06:25,560 --> 01:06:28,480
Speaker 1: storm chasers do a lot of good. Some are researchers

1149
01:06:28,520 --> 01:06:31,480
Speaker 1: trying to understand why some storms produce tornadoes and others

1150
01:06:31,480 --> 01:06:34,600
Speaker 1: do not. Tim Samaras, for example, combined his background and

1151
01:06:34,680 --> 01:06:38,200
Speaker 1: engineering and whether to invent devices for measuring conditions inside

1152
01:06:38,200 --> 01:06:41,880
Speaker 1: a tornado. His research has been valuable. Other researchers use

1153
01:06:41,920 --> 01:06:44,960
Speaker 1: mobile radar units to measure precipitation and wind inside a

1154
01:06:45,000 --> 01:06:48,480
Speaker 1: tornado from close range to gain a better understanding of

1155
01:06:48,520 --> 01:06:52,280
Speaker 1: how tornadoes develop. Other chasers are simply out there for

1156
01:06:52,320 --> 01:06:54,800
Speaker 1: the thrill of chasing, or to capture video to sell

1157
01:06:54,840 --> 01:06:58,040
Speaker 1: to media outlets. But as tornado video has become plentiful

1158
01:06:58,040 --> 01:07:01,560
Speaker 1: on YouTube and other websites, chasers have had to get

1159
01:07:01,600 --> 01:07:04,400
Speaker 1: closer than ever to get the kind of footage that

1160
01:07:04,440 --> 01:07:07,440
Speaker 1: will earn them a paycheck. They often find themselves in

1161
01:07:07,480 --> 01:07:10,800
Speaker 1: the bears cage, which is chaser lingo for the part

1162
01:07:10,800 --> 01:07:13,640
Speaker 1: of the storm where tornado forms. Some have built vehicles

1163
01:07:13,640 --> 01:07:17,680
Speaker 1: to drive directly into a twister. This carries enormous risk.

1164
01:07:18,440 --> 01:07:23,280
Speaker 1: Now he teaches meteorology and bring students with him on

1165
01:07:23,680 --> 01:07:27,640
Speaker 1: trips where they, uh, they observe these stormfronts and the

1166
01:07:27,680 --> 01:07:32,000
Speaker 1: weather conditions, so that the meteorologists have direct experience with

1167
01:07:32,080 --> 01:07:34,640
Speaker 1: this before they go on to whatever their careers are.

1168
01:07:35,040 --> 01:07:37,520
Speaker 1: But I thought it was really interesting to have a

1169
01:07:37,560 --> 01:07:41,000
Speaker 1: professional opinion added in there, because of course, like we

1170
01:07:41,040 --> 01:07:43,520
Speaker 1: said at the very top of the show, this is

1171
01:07:43,600 --> 01:07:47,400
Speaker 1: and we've repeated several times, this is serious, dangerous business. Uh,

1172
01:07:47,440 --> 01:07:51,280
Speaker 1: it's not something for just a casual attempt. You know,

1173
01:07:51,720 --> 01:07:54,520
Speaker 1: you definitely want experienced people around you. If you are

1174
01:07:54,560 --> 01:07:58,640
Speaker 1: interested in the field, that's amazing, but definitely seek out

1175
01:07:59,160 --> 01:08:03,080
Speaker 1: training and make sure that you're following this as as

1176
01:08:03,120 --> 01:08:06,840
Speaker 1: many safety procedures as you can, because this is this

1177
01:08:06,880 --> 01:08:10,040
Speaker 1: is deadly stuff. Um. But that that kind of wraps

1178
01:08:10,120 --> 01:08:12,360
Speaker 1: up this discussion. Uh, you know, it's kind of heavy

1179
01:08:12,360 --> 01:08:15,760
Speaker 1: in times, and and obviously you know, we've had our

1180
01:08:15,760 --> 01:08:18,280
Speaker 1: own personal experiences that kind of make give us our

1181
01:08:18,320 --> 01:08:22,000
Speaker 1: own perspective on that. But but it is a fascinating thing.

1182
01:08:22,000 --> 01:08:24,160
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, you're this is part of the

1183
01:08:24,200 --> 01:08:27,160
Speaker 1: adventurous spirit of human beings and the fact that there

1184
01:08:27,160 --> 01:08:29,840
Speaker 1: are people who are willing to put themselves at risk

1185
01:08:29,880 --> 01:08:33,200
Speaker 1: in order to gain more information and also get the

1186
01:08:33,240 --> 01:08:35,639
Speaker 1: knowledge out there about any storms that are developing. Yeah,

1187
01:08:35,960 --> 01:08:37,960
Speaker 1: people can get to safety. It's one of the reasons

1188
01:08:37,960 --> 01:08:41,839
Speaker 1: why I think humankind is such an amazing, amazing species.

1189
01:08:41,880 --> 01:08:44,240
Speaker 1: I mean, we're we're willing to do this sort of

1190
01:08:44,280 --> 01:08:47,559
Speaker 1: stuff for various motivations, but the fact that we are

1191
01:08:47,760 --> 01:08:51,080
Speaker 1: is just phenomenal. So guys, uh, I hope you enjoyed

1192
01:08:51,080 --> 01:08:53,360
Speaker 1: this episode of tech Stuff. If you have any suggestions

1193
01:08:53,360 --> 01:08:55,720
Speaker 1: for future topics or you want to comment, maybe you've

1194
01:08:55,720 --> 01:08:57,320
Speaker 1: looked through a tornado and you want to tell us

1195
01:08:57,360 --> 01:09:00,760
Speaker 1: your story, please do share that story with us. You

1196
01:09:00,800 --> 01:09:04,320
Speaker 1: can email us. Our address is tech stuff at Discovery

1197
01:09:04,400 --> 01:09:07,080
Speaker 1: dot com, or you can drop us a line on

1198
01:09:07,080 --> 01:09:09,840
Speaker 1: our social media Facebook and Twitter. You can find us

1199
01:09:09,880 --> 01:09:13,120
Speaker 1: with the handle text stuff hs W and Lauren and

1200
01:09:13,160 --> 01:09:21,680
Speaker 1: I will talk to you again really soon. Everyone for

1201
01:09:21,760 --> 01:09:24,160
Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics. Because it

1202
01:09:24,200 --> 01:09:34,960
Speaker 1: has to works dot Com