Tropical Soaking Florida to New England by Late Week (severe storm risk Oklahoma City; more fallout from Friday’s El Reno tornado-chasing tragedy)

An Active Pattern. NOAA’s latest 84-hour NAM model shows a disturbance pushing out of the Gulf of Mexico, spreading heavy rain into Florida and possibly coastal Alabama by late tomorrow. The next trough of low pressure whips up showery rains over the Upper Midwest, a few severe storms over the Central Plains. The west remains hot and dry, increasingly vulnerable to wildfires.


“…If anything, the events of Friday evening demonstrate storm chasers need to back off. For too long, too many chasers – both professional and amateur – have been crossing the line…” – excerpt of a post from Washington Post meteorologist Jason Samenow. Story below. Tweet above from a chronology from Digital Meteorologist, which has more on Friday evening’s tornado tragedy.

File photo of the late Tim Samaras, during a tornado intercept in New Manchester, South Dakota. Photo by Carsten Peter/National Geographic Image Collection.

Lessons From The El Reno Tragedy: The Chasing Conundrum. Life is rarely black or white. I do try to see the gray in every scenario, and there’s plenty of gray when it comes to tornado chasers. Do they serve a purpose? Absolutely, but too many chasers in one location at any given time can make it exponentially more dangerous for everyone. Friday evening’s tragedy, which resulted in at least 9 deaths, including tornado researcher Tim Samaras, was a reminder that there is inherent danger in the pursuit and intercept of nature’s most violent wind. In yesterday’s version of Climate Matters I take a look at the pro’s and cons of “chasing tornadoes”: “Chief Meteorologist Paul Douglas reflects on the the Friday night tornado tragedy that killed 9 people including 3 professional tornado researchers. Paul says we need to be careful in the media that we don’t incentivize and reward bad behavior. But there must be a balance because by broadcasting professionally shot tornado videos it can help show the public the danger and propel them to take cover or not get in their cars and drive.”

Recipe For Disaster. Image upper left from RadarScope app shows location of storm chasers in relation to El Reno tornado. Image upper right shows traffic jam on I-35 south of Oklahoma City, courtesy of KWTV.

Phased Array Doppler Loop of El Reno Tornado. This loop is from NSSL, showing Friday evening’s EF-3 in the western suburbs of OKC occluding, veering suddenly northeast, trapping many tornado chasers and researchers in the process, a deadly chain of events. Thanks to WeatherNation TV meteorologist Susie Martin for passing this along.

A Few Thoughts About Tornado Chasing. Things have really gotten out of control. This has been an accident waiting to happen for the better part of 20 years now. On some level I blame the movie “Twister”, which glamorized tornado research and inspired countless hundreds (thousands) of amateurs to try their hand at a tornado intercept, with visions of great video and local or national TV weather-glory. Ironic, since I helped with special effects with “Twister” and even had a line in the movie. I don’t want to be a hypocrite. I was in Oklahoma on 3 separate occasions, intercepting tornadic storms with NSSL, the National Severe Storms Lab. Every time I went down to Oklahoma I was struck by the number of people tagging along. Often scores, even hundreds of chasers would converge on the same cell by late afternoon. It’s a free country – you’re obviously free to drive when and where you want, and I certainly don’t want that to change, but something has to be done to avoid another tragedy like the one that killed 9 motorists Friday evening, including 3 professional tornado researchers Tim Samaras, his son, and intercept partner.

How 3 Storm Chasers Died, And What To Do About It. Here’s an excerpt of a thoughtful post from Greg Laden at scienceblogs.com: “…I have no idea how many of the people in the viewing area of this station saw or heard this report and responded by driving into the path of the tornado. Of those who did I don’t know how many of them were primed to use “drive away” as a strategy by earlier chatter in major media outlets, and elsewhere such as twitter and other social media. I’m not sure how many people actually got in their cars and “drove south.” We do know, however, that the highways in the area became jammed with cars, and the vicinity around the intersection of I35 and I40 was described as a “parking lot.” One thing we do know is that many people who “drove south” to get away from the tornado in fact drove directly into its path, created a traffic jam, and most of the deaths associated with this tornado were among those people in those cars. Three experienced tornado “chasers” … actual meteorological scientists … were killed when their truck (one of the vehicles depicted above, probably) was destroyed by the tornado. Other professional meteorologists, from The Weather Channel, were injured. As of this writing, the death toll stands at 13 with another 6 (though I’ve also heard 7) people still missing…”

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Paul Douglas