Do the best stormchasers have a "psychic" ability to find tornadoes?

[Skip Talbot]

I think the subconcious mind can do amazing things picking up on miniscule clues not evident to the "logical" mind and eventually some will just "know" where to go. I had a convo with my dad the other night when he was playing Gran Turismo...

Ah, the 18z GUT model. "I went with my gut for this target..." I hear this a lot, and I don't really buy it. The only thing my gut is good at predicting is when I need to make a mad dash for a rest stop after downing some bad gas station food. There are reasons you make decisions, and I think its important to understand why they were made. If its pattern recognition from past experience, then what setups are you being reminded of and how did they play out? If you're picking up visual cues in the sky, then what are they and what ingredients are responsible? If you're just basing your targeting decisions on some sort of instinctual feel, you're probably only getting a mix of the right signals. There's probably crap floating around in your head nudging you in other directions such as where that 15% hatched is laid out, where everyone on Spotter Network is lined up, and of what the morning's Facebook banter consisted. These distractions are going to dilute what may have been good target choices based on past experiences or parameters laid out by the morning's models and observations (even if you don't fully understand what these models and observations mean). If you know why you are at a particular spot, you'll feel so much more confident about being there, and be able to stick to your target later instead of sitting there all day wondering if you made the right decision and then being led astray later.

The Gran Turismo example is a little different as its a fast paced video game based heavily on repetitive reflexive moves and repetitive levels, where the mind has to be trained over and over to coordinate the hands into hitting the right buttons at the right time based on fast paced visual cues. Go with your gut in the video game, but stop and think about why you're chasing a particular target.

As for the chasers who magically score every single time, this is just an illusion. You're only seeing their successes. The names you recognize as people who score continuously are out there chasing A LOT. They have many days where they don't see tornadoes, and they had even more busted chases in their earlier years when they were working on gaining the experience they have now.

 

[Warren Faidley]

I think the "best" chasers have the right combination of: experience (both visual in the field and forecasting), live in the region so they can chase at any time and know regional patterns, roads, etc. (kind of like my knowledge here in AZ w/lightning), patience, willing to break speed limits and are willing to make their own decisions, avoiding the "too many cooks in the kitchen" issue. I've missed more classic events by listening to someone who I thought was an expert, or allowing others to dictate the route, pace, storm choice, etc. For example, during the Pampa event in June of 1995, my friend Tom and I were in route to my target area near Pampa when we crossed paths with a volunteer/friend from VORTEX who told us we should go further north along a boundary. My earlier observations told me any storm there would cross the boundary and weaken, but I figured the advice was coming from "top guys" who knew more than me, so I went north and missed the classic events to the south.

W.

 

[Chad Cowan]

The only two things that you need to be a successful and prolific storm chaser are passion and time spent. You usually can't have the later without the former. Time spent on a subject can't be faked, taught or learned, but you need a LOT of it to get the most out of chasing. The atmosphere is a fluid and fluids are largely predictable, so the more experience and pattern recognition you have under your belt, the higher your success rate will be.

 

[Simon Andersen]

Ah, the 18z GUT model. "I went with my gut for this target..." I hear this a lot, and I don't really buy it.

I agree with Jason and that was what I was trying to get at, but it obviously didn't land. I suspect some of it is a subconcious process and I suppose that could be called gut-feeling? Yes the game analogy is a little different in the way the mind goes through the process faster than what can be achieved with chasing, as I see it. The last point I agree with fully.

 

[hazelmaryjackson]

I never said I thought anyone got a hit every time, just that some chasers seemed better than others at picking targets which translated into tornadoes. And I wondered why. Yes of course experience counts and time spent and pattern recognition. We all know people in some fields who seem to lack the ability to pick up on the pattern recognition which is probably needed to make sense of all the white noise in our brains.

My husband plays bridge and he says there are some people who simply cannot "read" the cards, no matter how much experience they have (and sometimes they don't even realise this and baffle themselves with complicated systems, blaming their partners when they lose.) Yet there are some players with an instinctive card sense who start out good and just get better as they get more experience.

Sometimes I think too much information can be a bad thing, it clouds the perception, Maybe Josh has just too much information coming in all the time. That's not to say he isn't an outstanding researcher when it comes to analysing data collected. But if I wanted to be in on the action, I'd ride with Tim Samaras, assuming I got that choice of course!

 

[Sean Ramsey]

My husband plays bridge and he says there are some people who simply cannot "read" the cards, no matter how much experience they have (and sometimes they don't even realise this and baffle themselves with complicated systems, blaming their partners when they lose.) Yet there are some players with an instinctive card sense who start out good and just get better as they get more experience.

There might be people who have a talent for chasing where it comes easier than for others, though it would be hard to quantify. More than likely the talent would be in decision making, or pattern recognition as previously mentioned, or maybe even in research or learning. Chasing isn't like football, where someone has a natural ability to perform above average as soon as they step on the field. Chasing needs several ingredients like education, dedication, recognition, etc. to chase and be effective. It's very hard to imagine anyone who's never done it before just hopping in a car and being successful on a consistent basis relying only on natural ability.

 

[Rob Wadsworth]

I don't think that too much info is a 'bad thing'. The info - and all of it one can interpret - is at the crux of forecasting and chasing. I've had busts that was caused by me not understanding all of the data presented. A simple of thing of having cloud cover in the target area - when all other indicators are there - can turn a success into a bust. Learned that one this year. As Chad said, that understanding the behavior of moisture in the air is all it is. But from that point, forecasting is not as easy as it may appear after Chad's simplification.

If one can count cards; then the game becomes a calculated risk against the chances of the cards that have been accounted for. Not exactly an analogy to be used for chasing. But the experienced player is better equipped; I can totally agree with that part. Learning to avoid common mistakes is a common factor.

Dr Josh knows how to understand the data; that is what he does. Perhaps not forecasting, as Mr Marsh stated. Getting the data to reveal more understanding of the mechanics of the storm is what propels their studies. Chasers either will go on a chase knowing enough factors are present, they have the time, resources, risk a bust, and money. Understanding the info in context is what makes one more successful. AS well as avoiding the more common mistakes, as I admitted to above.

 

[Jeff Duda]

I agree that there's no substitute for pattern recognition and experience (which go hand-in-hand of course), but those qualities generally exist on the synoptic scale and to a lesser degree on the mesoscale. Once things break down and get more complicated, especially on the storm scale, those qualities will become less and less a factor in one's success. Also, most things in nature exist on a continuum and are distributed normally. I think chaser success is probably a normally distributed variable wherein there are a small number that are indeed more successful than others and most people have about the same amount of success. However, willingness to chase every day to drive thousands of miles in a day to get from one chase target to the next requires a special type of person. Most chasers don't have that choice, either due to lack of passion or due to a regular job and life outside of chasing.

 

[joel ewing]

Hazel, I just now for the first time read your post (Sat. 9-3) which started this discussion, and when I did, it made my blood boil immediately. I haven't even read anybody else's response to you yet, so perhaps I'll sound repetitive with this..but here goes...
I've been chasing for 25 plus years. I'm not a trained meteorologist, nor have I ever met Dr. Wurman. I've seen him next to me in the field many many times, and that's the extent of my contact with him. But I think you should know that he's legendary in this endeavor, and for a newbie like you....to just waltz right in and use the word "suck" with anything that pertains to Dr. Wurman is foolhardy and shows a lack of class. You might consider checking your attitude at the door before you start showing disrespect to anybody in here, much less a man who has had the weight of running the entire armada of Vortex 1 and 2 on his shoulders the past two years.

 

[Bryce Stone]

After watching the video, I commented to my wife "it seems that this man has the same capacity to scope out tornadoes hours ahead of the time that a healer instinctively knows what chakra (energy center) to go to to identify the problem & promote the best healing".

I must not respond to this part of your post. Must not (struggle) . . . must not.

But I will address your mention of seeing hits instead of misses. This actually happens all the time - we remember and amplify hits and forget misses, especially when we want to believe something. Psychics have known this for years and use it to their advantage. So yes, I think you're right. No one has the ability to accurately and repeatedly predict and view tornadoes, but if you chase long enough you will rack up enough hits to cause people to forget your misses and assume that you have some uncanny ability to predict tornadoes.

But it's not reality, of course. The reality is that, while experience makes one better, everyone busts probably more than they do not.

 

[Joey Ketcham]

Hazel, I just now for the first time read your post (Sat. 9-3) which started this discussion, and when I did, it made my blood boil immediately. I haven't even read anybody else's response to you yet, so perhaps I'll sound repetitive with this..but here goes...
I've been chasing for 25 plus years. I'm not a trained meteorologist, nor have I ever met Dr. Wurman. I've seen him next to me in the field many many times, and that's the extent of my contact with him. But I think you should know that he's legendary in this endeavor, and for a newbie like you....to just waltz right in and use the word "suck" with anything that pertains to Dr. Wurman is foolhardy and shows a lack of class. You might consider checking your attitude at the door before you start showing disrespect to anybody in here, much less a man who has had the weight of running the entire armada of Vortex 1 and 2 on his shoulders the past two years.

I have to agree, and even worse is Hazel came to her conclusion just by watching Storm Chasers.

Hazel, the difference between Dr. Wurman and storm chasers is that Dr. Wurman is not a storm chaser but rather a scientist whose goal is to collect data for research purposes. I'm sure I'm just echoing what others have said, but running an entire fleet of scientists that includes the DOW's isn't exactly as easy as a single chaser in a car driving around.

It is my opinion that it is very disrespectful and in poor taste for new chasers to come on board only to bash the more experienced, especially when their opinions are concluded from watching a TV show. Whatever happened to newbies just wanting to come on to learn? Now it seems like they are immediately entitled to bash veteran chasers and respected scientists. I just think it's in bad taste.

 

[hazelmaryjackson]

I think some of you are getting a little hot under the collar. I have only recently been able to go chasing in person but that does not mean that I have not been a keen weather watcher for many years.

I am sure that Dr Wurman is an ace analyser of the data once it is collected but, and I will concede here, I have only observed his forecasting of where tornadoes might be, over several series of StormChasers. Given that he has featured in several series, I might have thought the law of averages would have given him a greater success rate in forecasting, according to everyone here, than he seems to have.

I don't really see anyway why not being a red hot forecaster is really such a critical thing, if as I am sure he is, Dr Wurman leads his field in analysing data. In every field different experts have different strengths

I was just struck by the fact that however much information you have at your disposal and however well qualified you are academically, so often some other factor seems to come into play. Maybe it is pattern recognition, I am not sure.

I am just saying as a chaser, given a choice between chasing with Dr Wurman, and chasing with Tim Samaras, I would plump for Tim everytime.

 

[rdale]

Given the choice, most chasers would go on their own.

 

[Adam Lucio]

Answering the original question in the thread I am going to say definitely not. The "best chasers" simply have the freedom and means to chase everything they want. This will naturally improve their successes because they chase 100 times a year as opposed to someone who can only get out there 10 times a year. If you look at the track records of "the best" you will find the same amount of busts [if not more] as any other chaser.

Give me rich parents that can fund my chasing, or a major television network that can build me fancy vehicles and Ill produce the same results.

 

[Dave Gallaher]

This may be a bit far afield, but Dr. Ted Fujita, whose expertise and research is fundamental to many facets of tornado science today, didn't see many tornadoes in person if my memory is correct. For a long time, his Illinois license plate read TF-0000 for his having never seen a tornado. I think two different aspects of attraction to storms are at work in the people who dedicate their time and energy to them.