News DetailThis is how to storm chase!
Posted At: November 17, 2008 @ 12:51 AM
Posted By: Reed Timmer
Related Categories: Tornadoes
We need to do this next year!!!
TornadoVideos.net
extreme weather footage, photos & news
www.tornadovideos.net features some the of most intense weather videos, footage, and photos including tornado videos, tornado footage, tornado photos, hurricane videos, hurricane footage, and hurricane photos. Huge selection of stock video footage and HD tornado footage. Live storm tracking and real-time chasing.
News Detail
Calendar
Categories
Reed: Myself and two of my friends on the fire dept. are planning a storm chasing trip in May or June of 2009.We are all three medically trained and have been through our share of dicey situations. Our problem however is two fold; 1) None of us are trained storm chasers. 2) Since we will only have about 8 or 9 days, our time is somewhat limited. So if you could give us some advice on what time(may or june,beginning, middle, or end of the month) and what area to concentrate in, this info would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance. Chuck
I have built and launched quite a few model rockets in my lifetime. I had the idea to build a ground launched guided video rocket 20 years ago. Problem was video cameras were quite bulky and heavy back then. Things have changed. Light weight strong materials, increasingly small electronics, computer and radio control have come along way in recent years.
I first started storm chasing back in 1988. Long before wireless laptops, radar software and digital video. I relied mostly on gut instincts and luck. Equipped with nothing more than a ham radio and a 35mm camera I intercepted 7 tornadoes between 1989 and 1994 in the Midwest states of Indiana, Michigan and Ohio. In 1995 I gave up the chase and moved to Northern California to work as a farm equipment technician. Surprisingly, I was just lucky enough to witness large funnel just south of Oakdale, California one afternoon in December 1996 as I was leaving work in the town of Riverbank. It sure reminded me of my former days as a chaser. I moved to South East Alabama a few years ago. Ever since I eye witnessed the Enterprise, Alabama tornado of March 1st, 2007 from the back porch of my girlfriends home I have started collecting equipment in the anticipation of returning to the chase as time and money will allow.
I have a some great design ideas for a GAVP (Guided Ariel Video Probe) along with a great mechanical aptitude. I would be highly interested in being involved in building, launching and retrieving a video probe with fellow local chasers. I am also willing to share my ideas with the folks here at tornadovideos.net in the name of science. Just email me.
Jim Walker - Florala, Alabama.
Just don't get hit by lightning! Just kidding!
I'm guessing you wouldn't have to be afraid of ball lightning exactly but any form of lightning would be dangerous. Also the updrafts in the storm might not even put you into the area of rotation. There's always a chance that you miss.
Hi,guys
This radar were you can find that on the web?!
i'm searhing for data and saw you on tv:D but coudn't find that radar -.-
so if you guys can help me, all ready thanks :)
grZ jeroen,
Netherlands
I'm working on it Reed, we got to convince discovery it will be a good new angle! I'm sure it will be a good hit. I'm excited to try it out!
man, that looks so fun, i wish i could see a tornado, up in washington state, but never happens, but im gonna see 1 though, 1 day
Man I love that soundtrack. Think I'm gonna have to bust a move.
Uhhhh, what the hell was that?
I don't get it. Were they trying to make lightning with a rocket?
Didn't it sound like that pilot was drinking in the lounge for a few hours before the flight?
I know its not a tornado but this guy has the right idea!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVX1SXq_Etc
it looks as tryin get scientific rockets into the tornado or to destroy it. but for heads up i have no sound right now so cant hear wat there sayin about it
I've seen this clip before in an old tornado video I bought like 10 years ago haha. I think this experiment was performed in the late 70's but was cancelled because clearly they couldn't ever seem to actually hit the tornado with an unguided rocket.
Sounds like a plan! don't let the TIV team get to it though! I bet they try to think of some kind of armored contraption plane to fly through it!!
That was awesome, weak rocket though lol.
Murphy....
I was thinking the same thing!!!???
Cant help but wonder if they are allready working on it!! :))
GREAT VIDEO! thanks for sharing!!
I can't see the photo. It just shows blank white spot.
Plz help
Always thought it'd be interesting to shoot a real rocket into a tornado to weaken or destroy it before it hits a large populated town or something, as a last resort. Prob wont ever happen. Why not hook a couple weather rockets onto the TIV too. Helicopter chase would be exciting too...copyright ideas hah
Looks cool but the risks involved with that are extreme even with are technology you can never know when or where a tornado will turn or were it will go.
It they made that into a show it would be the most suspenseful show on T.V. discovery should pick that up.
I can see Sean with the TIV trying to do something like this. So are you guys going to try to fly rockets at tornados now? That would be kinda cool.
im really scared of natural disasters especially tornadoes yet i find them hella exciting...last night i couldnt even take a shower cause i couldnt stop watching the show its intense and amazing i love it...i would love to do what you do.last night i was watching the episode were the thingy broke and all it was was a monitor cable that was crazy.and when you were surrounded by all of those tornadoes when you were on that dirt road i was so nervous i felt like something was gonna happen but omg it didnt....then i took a shower anyways.i wanna do what you do how would i pursue that?
One of the most memorable experiences of my life occurred in the summer of 1975 when I flew a mission with the South Dakota Division of Weather Modification. We were doing cloud seeing on severe thunderstorms producing softball-sized hail. I never saw any tornadoes, but the plane I was in experienced severe turbulence and a downdraft that almost pushed it all the way to the ground. The perspective of being in the sky directly next to a storm is totally different from being on the ground. We flew with our wingtip a roll cloud. It was incredible. I still can't believe I did that.
In my post above, I meant to write "cloud seeding."
This board needs an editing function for poor typists like me. ;-)
Mikila- just to be very general..meteorology is the major you would study in college. I bet there is a more specific answer joel or reed could give you but if your still interested in weather by the time you get to college, pick a college that teaches meteorology as a major.
Grandforker- that sounds amazing. haha not much else to say about it.
It was amazing, joemankato. I wish I could get my hands on the photos I shot. I'd love to scan them and put them online. Unfortunately, because the weather modification program in South Dakota was terminated a year later, I have no idea what happened to those slides.
Reed This might be a good idea but at the same time what about the cross winds from the upper part of the wall cloud or top of the Funnel?Couldn't That pull you intop the Tornado?Because that would be a Life Threatening Thing to do.
Dont get me wrong Sean Casey had made the TIV A Successfull Experiment But Flying a Plane into or Near the Tornado would be Extremely Dangerous.
One Other Question Too for you.
Do you Plan on to Work with Josh or Sean Next Season?Because i think if you and Sean Work Together with Josh's Directions from the Dopplar's Perspective i think it would be a "Win,Win"Combination for both Teams.
Also one last Question Is RFT(Rear Flank DownDraft)The Core Of the Tornado itself or is it the Driving Force for the Entire Storm Cell?
Thanks Again You guys for all your Hard Work Every Season.I Hope you guys One Day track up here to St.Louis,Missouri sometime it would be an honor to meet someone that is brave like you and the rest of your TVN Team.
-John Owens From St.Louis,Missouri
"Instead of a Cessna 210 that he had flown before, Colgate and a student assistant were flying a Centruion 210, designed for "acrobatic stress" (Davidson 1996). It was a life-saving choice."
http://books.google.com/books?id=N6Tiz_7VmJoC&pg=PA175&lpg=PA175&dq=rocket+into+tornado+Los+Alamos+National+Lab&source=web&ots=YGz0Z-0KTz&sig=xJuYibwVmFyLGc2GWj8_Rno0Ue0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result#PPA175,M1
"Another more exotic device for making measurements in tornadoes was developed by Stirling Colgate, a physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory. He attempted for three seasons in the early 1980s to launch small, lightweight rockets, each weighing less than 1 kg, from a small airplane over Oklahoma and adjacent states (Colgate 1982). The idea of launching instrumented rockets into tornadoes had originated at Purdue in the late 1960s (Agee 1969; Agee 1970; Geddes et al. 1970). Each rocket was equipped to measure pressure, temperature, ionization, and electric field. Although Colgate was able to launch a few rockets into tornadoes, the rockets, which were built in accord with restrictive Federal Aviation Administration regulations, were too lightweight and fragile. Many rockets missed their target because they misfired after they had become soaked with water as the aircraft flew in heavy precipitation near the tornado. In addition, in 1982 the aircraft experienced extreme turbulence as it was caught in strong inflow to a tornado near cloud base, and had to make an emergency landing in an open field."
http://ams.allenpress.com/archive/1520-0434/14/4/pdf/i1520-0434-14-4-558.pdf
"His brush with death ended the air-launched rocket experiments that had taken years to prepare and seemed so feasible just a year before."
http://books.google.com/books?id=N6Tiz_7VmJoC&pg=PA175&lpg=PA175&dq=rocket+into+tornado+Los+Alamos+National+Lab&source=web&ots=YGz0Z-0KTz&sig=xJuYibwVmFyLGc2GWj8_Rno0Ue0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result#PPA175,M1
That was wild! "Think we need more power Scotty!" Wonder how many folks on the ground thought we was under attack by a cessena with rockets!
Wow! That was amazing how close they got to that tornado! It didn't sound like they were too scared at all. That makes my school year go even longer. I can't wait to graduate! So, I can go on to college for meteorology! I'm so excited!
Flying around tornadoes probably isn't very common, but it's not unheard of, either. Click on the link for my name and you'll see a photo of the first tornado I ever saw. It was in the mid-60s west of Pierre, S.D. My uncle took the picture. At the time, I was in a car driven by my aunt and we were almost directly below the the top of the funnel. The end was bouncing around on the ground about a half mile to the west of the highway.
The red arrow points to what appears to be a dark spot on the photo, but it's actually an AT-6 Texan (World War II trainer) that was being flown by the S.D. School of Mines and Technology as part of a weather research project. It was specially armored to prevent hail damage, sort of a TIV of the sky. We didn't even notice the plane at the time because we were so focused on avoiding the tornado.
A day or two later, there was a story in our local paper about the pilot who'd flown around the tornado. My uncle then realized that what he thought had been a spot on the negative was actually the research aircraft. It's a bit more obvious on the 11 x 14 enlargement I have of the original photo.
Rocket needs to be heavier and faster... unfortunatly the government likely wont allow it, but if it could be proven to work im sure there could be exceptions.. ive thought alot about this actually... from flying a plane to shooting rockets, also a slightly different idea and concept for the TIV which could likely with stand wind speeds of 200+ but be more mobile and be able to take the dirt backroads... a few of a million things im always thinking about
Hey all,
I've had the privledge of being around some of the people involved with the National Severe Storms Lab (nssl), based on what they have said: in the 70s they flew planes through the downdrafts, especially the rear flank downdraft. Now, the FAA has heavy restrictions on flying planes close to thunderstorms and pilots aren't as crazy as they use to be. So for VORTEX (Verification of the Origins of Rotation in Tornadoes EXperiment) II, they are planning on using UAVs, unmanned aircraft, to fly through the downdrafts.
This is important because we, as scientists, want to know where the air in the rearflank downdraft came from and if we know the temperature and moisture content of the air then we can trace it back to a source region in the thunderstorm.
Just amazing... This is so intriguing and makes sense. Just need to do it from the ground.. surface to air all the way... The vid is so right on as far as the research they were trying to obtain.
Paul... Really good comments as well as the links... This is where it should be going mates.. Reed... I got a super idea for ya.. but ya got to be on the intense insane mental side to achieve the results.. Thats all I am revealing attm.. Spring 2009... Yippie.. This is the stuff that makes storm chasing well worth pursuing.. Oh Ya... Adrenaline mates...
Who ever found this vid .. Kuddos to ya.. This is the stuff us crazy chasers need to be striving towards.. Count me in.. I am all over this type of craziness !! Cheers Mates...
Id like to see Reed get on a rocket. And ride it into the tornado. Reed just think of the footage you would get. LMFAO
haha Troy that would be so funny!! Reed you should def do that! OK wayyy random! i got the perfect thing to ride in on tho! i was watching Die Another Day(James Bond for those who dont know) and towards the end Bond hops outta a plane in some mini aircraft thing. that would be perfect to use!...ahhh if only the things Bond did could actually be done!
There are much better rockets to do this with today.
I have a quarter-scale Patriot missile at home that has a good payload bay for this application. A thinner airframe (3" perhaps) with a 54-mm motor would probably be able to push enough speed to penetrate the vortex.
Reed, if you'd like to chat about possibilities with rockets (including flying them with cameras in them) let me know. They could also be used for lightning strike study (and have been before). The NASA guys used small Aerotech rockets to do this with wire attached.
To break into a tornado I'd go with a PML rocket with a 38 or 54-mm motor. If you could deploy a launcher alongside one (like when you get some of your shots) you could ground launch into the vortex with instruments on board.
That would be cool stuff. I think my PML Quasar (max altitude 8,000 ft.) would be good.
Adam
Reed, im game for that let me know when your doing it !! plus next season i want to chase with your team let me know. your team is just so much better than josh's team!
Here is my vision of what Reed's next step needs to be........ LOL......
Fly it right into a Nado........
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13kvDh0B6bc
COLGATE used INSTRUMENTED ROCKET!
It's not very effective ...
You need to show that to Sean Casey and tell him to put a camera on the rocket for his "ultimate" shot.
That rocket looked like a piece a crap. It didn't even get close to going in.
I actually have the video that you got that from.
In the video they said that the government restricted the propellent. I wonder if this restriction is for a combustable propellent? If so why couldn"t someone could develop a rocket with enough compressed air to fly a larger rocket. You probably cant get enough distance though.
Even better why not try a remote controlled plane and go on a kamikaze mission. It might not work, but could be worth a try.
Reed if you mount an HD camera on a remote controlled plane that would be awesome!
I'd be more than happy to fly the rc plane for them, although I don't think it could survive the tornado long enough to penetrate it.
That would definitely be a cool way to shoot one of these monsters. Did Jimmy Stewart narrate this old clip?
Wow Reed I'm glad you posted this its good to hear comments and ideas about this project, it going to help out a lot. So you want to come up in the plane with me? Oh and to answer someones question about the rocket haha, and Dan I love the Jet Pack I laughed when I saw that. OH! and Adam Amick please email me, Sean and I actually want to make the rockets with video capability, and yes for Sean's Film
These rockets that where shot into this tornado would survive as long as a probe going through Jupiter's atmosphere. But any effort is as good as nothing.
Hah I have this video! last one almost made it in!
Interesting video. My dad flew a 210 when I was a kid. I can't decide which seems more strange, flying that close to a funnel, or firing rockets off the wings of that particular aircraft. FWIW, according to the FAA website, Stirling Colgate still owns that plane.
Although rockets have a "coolness" factor, for anyone who has ever shot an unguided model rocket sideways (dangerous), it comes back to earth faster than a bad football throw. This will be very difficult to aim, especially with a heavy cross-wind component.
I’m no tornado expert, but if there’s an in-flux of air near the base, a simple weather balloon with streamer or parachute draped over, in case of puncture, should work very nicely to be drawn in with equipment. Seeing Reed's team, I bet they could get close enough to deploy. With a bit more complexity, there are also RC kites that are so light and flexible; they could be remotely piloted until the wind force overtakes them. Keep up the awesome footage guys!
Reed Why Fly Towards It In a Plane to Fire a Rocket When You Can Use a Guided Rocket Launched From The Ground??? From What I've Seen You and Your Team Get More Than Close Enough to a Tornado to Fire a Rocket and I'm Sure the Military Would Loan You a Stinger Missile or Two in The Name of Science?? It Sounds Crazy but it is plausible!!
All you need really is a large leather strap, a metal pipe that's buried in the ground and BAM! You can get right in the middle of an EF5 without a scratch! Why, they did it in the movie "Twister," right? Right?
:-)
I don't know much about weather instruments but if you can get them light enough this could work. Even the store bought Estes rockets have options for payloads. They also blow a parachutes that would allow the rocket to float down.
You would have to get damn close to launch it and don't use any motor less then a D.
Hey that was really cool!!! I hope that i can chase tornadoes one day like Reed Timmer. He does a really good job on stormcahsers the show. I am 13. I want to be a meteorologist/ Storm chaser but everyone says i'm crazy. I take it as a compliment though.
Well...in theory it should work. This is something we talked about in a seminar a few weeks ago. Actually flying an unmanned plane into a tornado. The difficulty as you all should well know is the strong downdraft associated around the tornado, not to mention flying into wicked updrafts. The missle idea is not going to work for that reason. It needs more thought and engineering. If you noticed in the shot, the missle went directly down, didn't even penetrate the tornado. It will be very hard to manage this. I have actually thought about it, and I think flying an unmanned plane into the meso, but before you reach the down draft, some how engineer the plane to be drawn into the downdraft and have it deploy a package containing 100 or so buoyant probes that will get pulled into the base via the downdraft, and hopefully recycle back into the tornado giving the needed data. Still a long shot, and takes all the excitement out of actually getting close and setting pods.
There was a guy in Indiana that was experimenting with the exploding salt rockets. He had a rig he made from a concrete pumper truck,and he somehow converted it into a pressure truck that shot rockets miles using the air and water pressure. He said he did it this way for safety and it's nearly impossible to get clearance to use rockets big enough for what he needed. There is video of this out there somewhere I will try to find it. Anyway, a bunch of us spotters followed him one day and watched this thing in action, it was quite amazing, it actually disrupted the twister momentarily, and it wasnt even a direct hit. I dont know if he has ever been successful or not, as that was the only time I saw it. I'm guessing it's the same principle as the company that says it can weaken hurricanes using salting planes, but i'm not sure about the science behind his experiments. If I can find our video I will upload it, the rocket is the most amazing part, it's just an EF1
At the time, that was a pretty crazy idea. He was really risking death flying one of those old light aircraft near a tornado. I've nearly warped wings flying into moderate thunderstorms over Kansas in old Cessnas. Those rockets were pretty useless; they just didn't have the power or the guidance to come anywhere close to the funnel. You could see that pretty obviously in the video.
I think the concept could be updated. You'd need a more powerful rocket, with guidance, and a much more sturdy aircraft. You could put a simple guidance system on a rocket and a camera pretty cheaply these days. You'd also need to have a sturdy aerobatic aircraft. A Lane Air Tractor might work. It's a heavy duty commercial aircraft easily found on the Great Plains. The Air Tractor is extremely durable and capable of high G maneuvers; it's pretty slow, though, and it's wing design could get it tossed in high cross winds. You'd have to test it out. It should be easy to put hard points on an Air Tractor for launches.
If money were no object, an A-10 Thunderbolt II (Warthog) would be a perfect research platform. The A-10 has better armor than any of the TIVs. You could probably fly it right into a moderate tornado, although I wouldn't recommend it. However, I think you'd have to cough up $7 million or more for one. By government standards, it's one of the cheapest aircraft they fly. It's two cheap turbofan engines of the kind used on corporate jets, armor, a stick, rudder pedals, and a big Gatling gun in the military version. There's not much to it and it's ugly, which is why it's called the Warthog.
With modern armor, aircraft, and rockets, this experiment maybe worth revisiting. You could probably get some cool data for a paper. The camera would give you some cool pictures, especially if it deployed some kind of retardation device once inside of the funnel.
Of course, a ground launched rocket from a vehicle would be even cheaper, but you wouldn't have the advantage of the chasing speed of an aircraft. You could cross several States in a day in an aircraft.
The one point I think some are missing in all this is the liability. Who pays if somthing goes wrong, such as a missile going off course and hitting a building or starting a serious fire? There's actually a good reason why many of the things proposed in this thread aren't being done and will probably never be attempted.
Can't you just skydive in a tornado?
Yeah, that sounds a bit more sane Patrick. Just sky dive into a super cell moving northeast at 60 mph. Keep it on the ground. It is way more suspensefull. You start taking it to the air it has to be an unmanned plane, and it would be pricey.
Yeah I know, it was just a thought. I love to watch Stormchasers, but all they do is trying to get to the tornado via the ground. I seriously wunder if it isn't possible at all to probe a tornado from above. Basically you have very strong updraft winds in a tornado. A probe, dropped from high flying plane could be suspended for a while, and not being destroyed by debris which is mostly at the base of the tornado. Skydiving in a tornado would be the most sickest, but coolest thing a human could try. He would get a very protective suit and face protection. If he could film his fall and survive it, he would be instant famous for doing it. Still hoping you won't get fried by a ball of lightning :P
Greetz,
Patrick
The Netherlands.