Storm chasing is broadly defined as the deliberate pursuit of any severe weather phenomenon, regardless of motive, but most commonly for curiosity, adventure, scientific investigation, or for news or media coverage. A person who chases storms is known as a storm chaser or simply a chaser.
Stephanie Abrams is an American television meteorologist who has worked for The Weather Channel (TWC) since 2003. She currently co-hosts AMHQ with Jen Carfagno and Jim Cantore early weekday mornings. She is also employed by NBC News and occasionally appears on NBC Nightly News, Today and MSNBC.
A multiple-vortex tornado is a tornado that contains several vortices revolving around, inside of, and as part of the main vortex. The only times multiple vortices may be visible are when the tornado is first forming or when condensation and debris are balanced such that subvortices are apparent without being obscured. They can add over 100 mph to the ground-relative wind in a tornado circulation and are responsible for most cases where narrow arcs of extreme destruction lie right next to weak damage within tornado paths.
Storm Stories is an American non-fiction television series that airs on The Weather Channel (TWC) and Zone Reality. It is hosted and narrated by meteorologist and storm tracker Jim Cantore. Storm Stories showcases various types of severe weather, such as tornadoes, hurricanes, and blizzards. Each episode features a famous severe storm, and survivors of it sharing their experiences. The program also features footage of the storm if it is available, but typically a re-enactment is used instead. The video of the storm is often shown while the survivors offer their accounts of it. Often, TWC would air a special week dedicated to one specific type of storm.
WSYX is a television station in Columbus, Ohio, United States, affiliated with ABC, MyNetworkTV and Fox. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, which provides certain services to TBD station WTTE and Chillicothe-licensed CW affiliate WWHO under separate local marketing agreements (LMAs). However, Sinclair effectively owns WTTE as the majority of Cunningham's stock is owned by the family of deceased group founder Julian Smith. The stations share studios on Dublin Road in Grandview Heights, while WSYX's transmitter is located in the Franklinton section of Columbus.
Storm Chasers is an American documentary reality television series that premiered on October 17, 2007, on the Discovery Channel. Produced by Original Media, the program follows several teams of storm chasers as they attempt to intercept tornadoes in Tornado Alley in the United States. The show was canceled at the end of its 5th season by Discovery Communications on January 21, 2012.
Weather Center Live was an American weather news television program on The Weather Channel. Airing in various timeslots throughout the daytime hours and serving as The Weather Channel's de facto flagship forecast program, it features weather forecasts, analysis and weather-related feature segments. This program, the current incarnation of Weather Center, debuted on March 2, 2009.
The Verification of the Origins of Rotation in Tornadoes Experiment are field experiments that study tornadoes. VORTEX1 was the first time scientists completely researched the entire evolution of a tornado with an array of instrumentation, enabling a greater understanding of the processes involved with tornadogenesis. A violent tornado near Union City, Oklahoma was documented in its entirety by chasers of the Tornado Intercept Project (TIP) in 1973. Their visual observations led to advancement in understanding of tornado structure and life cycles.
Tony Laubach is an American storm chaser and meteorologist. He has participated in several field research projects and is one of the surviving members of TWISTEX. He has been contracted as a severe weather photojournalist for various major television networks, and has starred in several television shows, including Seasons 3 through 5 of Storm Chasers on the Discovery Channel.
The Weather Channel is an American basic cable and satellite television channel owned by Byron Allen's Entertainment Studios that focuses on national and international weather information; although in recent years, the channel has also incorporated entertainment-based programs related to weather on its schedule. This article details the history of the channel, which dates back its founding to around 1980.
America's Morning Headquarters is an American morning television program on The Weather Channel. Airing every morning from 6 a.m. to 12 p.m. Eastern Time, the program focuses on morning weather conditions, news and business information from around the country. The program debuted on January 3, 2000, under its original title. If there is a major weather event, it used to air until 10 am, however since 2017, it's usually cut back an hour for additional live broadcasts for Weather Center Live.
Evening Edition is an American weather program broadcast by The Weather Channel. Evening Edition included multiple hours of programming, cut into by long-form programs such as When Weather Changed History, as well as a repeating overnight hour.
TWISTEX was a tornado research experiment that was founded and led by Tim Samaras of Bennett, Colorado, US, that ended in the deaths of three researchers in the 2013 El Reno tornado. The experiment announced in 2015 that there were some plans for future operations, but no additional information has been announced since.
Dr. Reed Timmer is an American meteorologist and storm chaser. He is known for starring in the Discovery Channel reality television series Storm Chasers, as well as in the documentary film Tornado Glory and in the series Tornado Chasers. He also worked with Mike Theiss in the reality television series Storms Rising on Disney+.
David Payne is an American television meteorologist and storm chaser. He currently serves as the chief meteorologist for CBS affiliate KWTV-DT in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
The SRV Dominator is the name given to a series of vehicles used for Reed Timmer, as featured on the Discovery Channel series Storm Chasers. In April 2013, Timmer, designer and operator of all three Dominator vehicles, joined KFOR-TV's 4WARN Storm Team, all three vehicles collectively referred to by the station as "Dominator 4".
Jonathan M. "Jon" Davies is an American meteorologist, storm chaser, and author. An operational meteorologist, Davies is a weather forecaster and is known for his mesoscale meteorology research related to tornadoes and convective storms. He is a major discoverer of the minisupercell thunderstorm now often referred to as a low-topped supercell, pioneered significant research on tornado environments including on cold-core situations and the importance of low-level buoyancy in some deceptively low-CAPE tornado situations, and produced important case studies.
Timothy Michael Samaras was an American engineer and storm chaser best known for his field research on tornadoes and time on the Discovery Channel show Storm Chasers. He died in the 2013 El Reno tornado.
During the early evening of Friday, May 31, 2013, an extremely large and powerful tornado occurred over rural areas of Central Oklahoma. This rain-wrapped, multiple-vortex tornado was the widest tornado ever recorded and was part of a larger weather system that produced dozens of tornadoes over the preceding days. The tornado initially touched down at 6:03 p.m. Central Daylight Time (2303 UTC) about 8.3 miles (13.4 km) west-southwest of El Reno, rapidly growing in size and becoming more violent as it tracked through central portions of Canadian County. Remaining over mostly open terrain, the tornado did not impact many structures; however, measurements from mobile weather radars revealed extreme winds up to 135.0 m/s within the vortex. These are among the highest observed wind speeds on Earth, just slightly lower than the wind speeds of the 1999 Bridge Creek–Moore tornado. As it crossed U.S. 81, it had grown to a record-breaking width of 2.6 miles (4.2 km), beating the previous width record set in 2004. Turning northeastward, the tornado soon weakened. Upon crossing Interstate 40, the tornado dissipated around 6:43 p.m. CDT (2343 UTC), after tracking for 16.2 miles (26.1 km), it avoided affecting the more densely populated areas near and within the Oklahoma City metropolitan area.
