Who are the ultimate storm chasers?

d ~ 360'192'000 km: day 140

Scientists have worked tirelessly to better understand the makings of a tornado and projects such as VORTEX II or the TWISTEX team, the first to get an inside view of a tornado, are regarded highly in their field.

The objective of this research is a better understanding of how tornadoes are generated and why one supercell drops a tornado and another doesn't, in order to increase tornado warning lead times and improve the validity of data amongst other things.

Storm chasers are keen on photographing and filming these storms as well as understanding how they work. But as May draws to a close and we move eventually into what is regarded the last month of 'tornado season' - we want to know who are the ultimate storm chasers and why?

Being a non chaser myself it has been fascinating speaking with experienced chasers. But do these type of 'responsible' chasers get enough credit? Or does the limelight shine only on chasers who risk their lives to get the shot?

Which brings me on to the level of risk and the assumption that chasers have a desire for destruction. Tornadoes are categorized by their level of intensity, ranging from a category F0 (minor damage) to an F5 (total damage) on the Fujita scale. It's no secret that some chasers would love to see an F5 tornado. But because you want to see a huge funnel whizzing at speeds of 261-318 miles per hour, doesn't automatically mean you want the destruction that is part and parcel of it. There's definitely a fine line there.

Leave a comment and let the team know who you think ranks at the top. A lot of names are flying about, to name a few - Roger Edwards, Chuck Doswell, Reed Timmer, Stuart Robinson, Paul Knightly of UK weather world, and Paul Sherman of Netweather - the list is endless. But what we really want to know is what makes the legends, legends?

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