Tim Samaras has a passion for chasing tornadoes and studying monster storms up close.  It’s not exactly what his mother had in mind years ago when she introduced her son to the motion picture classic The Wizard of Oz.  But seeing that movie as a young boy would turn out to be a life-defining experience for Tim.

 

As a senior engineer for Applied Research Associates in Colorado, Tim’s background includes building sophisticated electronics and instrumentation equipment.  He designs deployable probes that he calls “turtles” to study the tornadoes he chases across the Midwest, from North Dakota to Texas, and as far east as Indiana. Prime time for storm chasing is May and June, and Tim logs about 30,000 each year during these two months, searching for storms that are capable of producing the most violent weather on Earth. Tim’s important expeditionary work has also earned him a place as an Emerging Explorer with National Geographic.

 

“We don’t know sometimes why some thunderstorms produce tornadoes and others don’t,” explains Tim.  “The other thing we really don’t have a good handle on is what’s happening in the bottom part of the tornado—the part that exists from basically ground level up to 30 feet, or 10 meters.  This is the least understood part because it is the part that is extremely difficult to measure.”  It is also the part where the storm dramatically affects human lives, our homes, shops, offices, roads, and other infrastructure.

 

And that is why Tim is so interested in learning more about how tornadoes form and behave close to the ground. The instrument probes with pressure sensors and cameras that Tim builds are designed to sit on the ground and measure tornado dynamics as the tornado passes near them or over them.  To collect the most valuable data, the trick for Tim is to know where a tornado will likely develop, getting there in time, and being close enough to drop the probes in its path while still having time to escape.  When he gets a successful hit, he then inputs this real data into computer models to create simulated tornadoes that more closely resemble the real thing. Real data can then be modified in a computer to see how a real tornado would be affected by changing conditions. Says Tim about the value of this information, “That’s why the data is so important, because if you get factual data in these programs, they perform actually quite well. That way you don’t let the computer guess what’s going to happen—it’s based on actual data.”