Black eye in Canadian style for chasers?

Tarmo Tanilsoo

Tarmo Tanilsoo

EF5
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Laguja, Estonia, Europe
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/manitoba/story/2007/06/26/tornado-viz.html?ref=rss

Estonian Weather site ilm.ee picked this news story up. Apparently, too many people, even children were out there watching the storm instead of heeding the warnings. Environment Canada says that storm chasing should be let to do for trained pros. I guess random yahoos just gave us a black eye again.

BTW, Reed, your video was embedded to ilm.ee's news page. See the news page containing it at http://ilm.ee/?43667. Title for the video is "23.07.2007(I think they meaned 23.06.2007) Amateur video done in Canadian province of Manitoba", you can comment that news page here(Nimi: Name; Kommentaar: Comment).
 
What I'm reading here is for the general public to act appropiately and take shelter when warned. I believe the "trained professionals" would refer to spotters and chasers. Opinions from the Canadians on board?
 
I understand it as that non-chasers/locals shouldn't go after them... which I do agree with because they wouldn't know the proper way to chase tornadoes to begin with. I wouldn't consider this putting Canadian chasers in a bad light... although I do question Phillips' comment regarding chasers being seriously hurt in the past... is he referring to the odd chaser who's been struck by lightning? Has there been a chaser who was seriously hurt from a tornado/debris? What is his source?

Were these locals actually getting in their car to get closer to the tornado or were they watching it from their house not in harm's way? Both are like comparing apples and oranges. I don't see anything wrong with people watching it from their house if they are safe enough away and not in the path.

Look at how many chasers are out there these days, and look at how many actually get hurt from the storm... quite a large ratio. You hear of the odd ones getting hit by lightning... but that can happen to even your average Jim-Bob walking down the street and getting hit by a "bolt out of the blue".

I don't like to use the term professional chaser. What does it really mean anyway? Usually when you use professional, it is job/career related... as in "profession".
 
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People(or "weather experts") should just worry about what they are doing and quit calling everyone else stupid for wanting to watch the sky(or "storm porn"). Go to your own basement and shut your hole as far as I'm concerned. God that same crap gets old.

And who gives a **** about a black eye. Your eye's already black for liking storm porn.
 
LOL exactly... in fact, if more people watch storms, they're gonna get more reports and ground truthing of these tornadoes. Funny how things work.

What's even funnier is that Canwarn (Canadian Skywarn equiv.) won't condone chasing. I've told the guys who've heckled us chasers in the past that it's the chasers who drive to the storms that get to see what's really happening... how else are most spotters going to see anything from their basement, and most likely, with trees in the way of their windows? Would be nice if Canwarn had mobile storm spotting like Skywarn, but they're too worried about liabilities.
 
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Environment Canada and Storm Chasing

It seems so ironic hearing Canadian meteorologists lecturing storm chasers. The quality of knowledge about convective weather among some so called professionals up here is so abysmal that I would trust the input from some chasers regarding the nature of severe convection before that of many of the so-called professionals.

It seems like whenever there is a setup for severe convective weather here in Southern Ontario there is never any distinction about the types of threat.....Torrential downpours, damaging winds and large hail always seemed to be mentioned every time, along with the usual "remember, some severe thunderstorms produce tornadoes".

This statement always seems to stay the same, even if there is not enough DAPE for strong downdrafts (or storms are elevated) for damaging winds, or the CAPE is too low and the Wet-Bulb Freezing Level hopelessly high for non supercell storms to produce large hail, or the LCL is to high, shear too unidirectional and storms too linear and outflow dominated to produce tornadoes.

Another thing that drives me nuts is the numerous reports of "funnel clouds" by the public virtualy every thunderstorm outbreak day when people see odd looking scud protuberances or cloud tags along gust fronts.

Ironically, on August 19,2005 when we had two long track F2+ tornadoes, there were almost no public reports because the cloud bases were so low and the mesocyclones so choked with blinding rain shafts. Also that day, haze and low stratocumulus made visibility terrible.
 
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I remember JF Massicotte and Steeve Laurin chasing a supercell this summer at Trois-Rivieres, Quebec. They tracked a strong-rotating meso that gave a funnel cloud. They called Environment Canada and they updated the warnings with a tornado warning.

In Canada, we almost never see any tornado warnings. We have severe T-Storms warnings, because meteorologists in EC offices can see what's happening with their private level III data.

Looking back the the story about JF, I think it's the first time a tornado warning is emitted because of a chaser's report, and I think it's the beginning of a slow progress.

In the article, what is a "professionnal chaser" ? Someone who chase for money? Look, in Quebec province, we have 6 tornadoes reported per year. In ontario, it's a little higher. Who's the man who can make money with this? lol
 
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