Hurricane Chasing Tours?

[James K]

I’ll have to find a thread to discuss rhis further (or start a new one). There is a huge risk with garages that most are over looking.

Maybe I'm thinking wrong, the one thing that comes right to my mind with a parking garage would be: what if the storm surge (or more technically all the large crap floating in it) takes out some of the support columns? Basically "take out the foundation and the rest comes down"
In the real world I don't know if that would be an issue, but I couldn't help thinking about it. The same sort of thought sometimes crosses my mind in large buildings - 'if something was to happen to some of these columns', would the whole thing come down.

 

[Dan Robinson]

That did happen in Katrina, the location escapes me but it was a nearby casino barge that broke loose and took out the corner of a structure. Most locations, that risk is pretty low as ships big enough to do that would have to be offshore in the middle of the storm. Most ships are moved out of the way of the storm. You'd mainly have to worry if there was something large moored nearby. Also, most parking garages aren't right on the water but a few blocks inland.

 

[Warren Faidley]

I did an extensive survey of parking structures following Katrina while in Biloxi. I suspect I'll be back someday. The biggest problem was not so much the total collapse of parking garages, but rather, the ramps leading / in out of the structures. Many ramps were constructed as somewhat free hanging concrete slabs that were displaced and fell -- or some were undermined by the 15+ storm surge. Thus, you would not be able to exit. I always carry 30-40ft. of climbing rope just in case. We might want to move this topic over to hurricanes, but it's a good discussion to have.

 

[Bobby Little]

I agree warren. The first thing i thought about these garages was that the massive debris will flows/blow/collect in at the lower level... thus making it very hard to leave the structure.

 

[Warren Faidley]

I should note that many private, paid and similar garages now close off the entrances and exits as soon as the storm threatens to protect stored vehicles. This almost happened to me following Irma, despite promises from the security company that they would keep the exits open. There is no guarantee either way, so enter at your own risk.

 

[Douglas Kiesling]

I know several people tried to do Hurricane Chasing Tours and even Blizzard Tours a while back and it did not work. Unlike the tornado chasing tours, you are on call 24x7 to try and fly into a location that is shutting down and as others have said you will have zero services.

I did manage to chase Hurricane Michael, you can read my write up on the blog www.hurricanemichaelblog.com that details the crazy events from that chase where only skill, knowledge and a little luck got me to be able to drive through the right front quadrant of the Cat 5 and surf the surge into the eye of the storm where the blue sky lasted only about 10 minutes while hearing the lightning and roar a mile away as I was in the calm with birds flying over head. I've also chased the insane 2004 and 2005, 2008 2011, 2016 hurricane seasons and rode out Katrina in New Orleans and got the heck out the next day when locals started pulling guns on others and total chaos started to take place as rescuers were stopped by the flooding on the interstate.

I thought about doing the tour thing for a long time with a few people that keep asking to tag along but several factors get in the way. Do you know this person? Will they panic and freak out in the eye wall? Will you get along with this person? If they are in their own vehicle and they break down, what are you going to do? I can pretty much count on one hand the number of people I would chase a hurricane with and trust them with my life. And that is just it, you need to trust them with your life.

As for parking garages, a lot of places are just kicking people out of parking garages now for liability. You might get lucky with an AirBNB but even then, they might kick you out. I know in hurricane Matthew, my hotel shut down and kicked everyone out. All the AirBNB options said no because the Governor of Florida put out a mandatory evacuation order. You could try and stay with all the other media but most cases they stay out of the worst due to insurance liability.

One thing that I will remember after Michael was the fact that after the storm, I did find people that were messed up. Then it was another 90 minutes before I saw another soul so I was walking around ground zero thinking other then the injured I had to help out, was I the last one left alive?

Hurricane chasing is Not Storm Chasing. A tornado takes out a town, just go to the next town over and get food, fuel, hotel, and anything else you might need. Hurricanes take out cities and entire coastlines, counties and as others have said you have to be self sufficient for everything from food, fuel, water, bathroom and what do you do when you find you are the only one on scene to help injured people in a evacuation zone that did not evacuate or worse yet, coming across someone that has passed away.

 

[Joe Cameron]

how about just calling it irresponsible and not doing it.

 

[Jade Vajna]

Wow, this is a lot of info! Thank you all! The parking garage thing is definitely something to consider. I guess it just depends what category you are dealing with and how far inland the garage is. And I agree.. The person/people you go with have to be people you trust and get along with. Ideally, I could go with people I know. But we'll see.

 

[Jamie Winterstern]

Anyone know of any tours or veteran chasers that take people on hurricane chases? This is something I've wanted to do for the longest time, but I want to be smart about it and go with people who have experience and not just go alone or with a total random. Any info would be great! Thanks!

Look up Jeff Piotrowski. One of my favorite chasers that I follow on Twitter who always seems to be live tweeting from inside the eye wall of the biggest landfalls. I remember his broadcasting from inside Hurricane Harvey a couple years ago, he's amazing.

 

[Andy Wehrle]

Hurricane chasing is Not Storm Chasing. A tornado takes out a town, just go to the next town over and get food, fuel, hotel, and anything else you might need. Hurricanes take out cities and entire coastlines, counties and as others have said you have to be self sufficient for everything from food, fuel, water, bathroom and what do you do when you find you are the only one on scene to help injured people in a evacuation zone that did not evacuate or worse yet, coming across someone that has passed away.

Well said. Probably the only tornado event aftermath that comes close to approximating that of a major hurricane landfall is a once-in-several-decades outbreak like April 27th, 2011, where a big chunk of northern and central Alabama had widespread and prolonged power outages (and thus lack of operating gas stations), numerous roads impassable due to trees, power lines and debris, etc.

 

[Warren Faidley]

Unless you have the means and knowledge to carry a lot of extra fuel, you could be left stranded somewhere very unpleasant or deadly. I will go as far as saying that "acquiring" / saving fuel is a stand alone "art" during a hurricane. No power = no gas pumps in addition to fuel depletion. You can't (unless you are an idiot) store large quantities of fuel inside your vehicle. (I once saw a woman who had her two little kids sitting in a back seat with several milk cartons of gas, in addition to her smoking a cigarette). Most experienced hurricane chases know the techniques but don't openly share them to try and limit the number of people emulating the same techniques. Most experienced hurricane chasers will also disable any tracking software, to avoid the "Kling-on" Empire from crashing your secret location. On a fun note, I once had Geraldo Rivera call me for an interview during a Gulf Coast hurricane, but I refused to drive the 10 miles and back to the news station. When I finally got out of the strike zone, I had to drive over 100 miles to find gas. I made the station on vapors.

 

[JamesCaruso]

Warren’s post about gas is just another reason I wrote above that I find the logistics of hurricane chasing too much to wrap my head around... Then you have some people say it’s practical to find hotels and parking garages, and others saying they’ve been kicked out of both. Clearly it’s possible to chase a hurricane, as people on here have done successfully and safely. But starting with no experience, and getting any good at something you may only even have a chance to do once every few years, seems pretty much impossible to me. But I’m not taking it off my bucket list just yet...

 

[Jade Vajna]

Yeah I am aware of the risks.. Which is why I'm not going to just go at it alone. I know some experienced chasers so reaching out to them is probably my best bet.. It's just a matter of convincing them to let me tag along.. Haha. Thank you all for your input! ☺

 

[Bobby Little]

Jade, It looks like you have an early chase chance this week around New Orleans....party then play.

 

[Dan Robinson]

When it comes to parking garages, I generally go in only to hunker down shortly before landfall. This reduces the risk of getting kicked out, as any security personnel are usually long gone by then.

Gas is one of the biggest challenges as Warren pointed out. The containers definitely need to be kept outside of the vehicle, even the newer ones that have good seals. There are a lot of options to do this with various tailgate or roof racks, as well as special containers that are made for mounting. That all needs to be planned out and fitted long before the chase begins. Some chasers wrap the containers in tarp to hide them from looters, though
I have never done this as tarps don't last long in hurricane-force winds.

My personal hurricane chase spec is at least a tank and a half of extra fuel in containers. I don't like driving on the highway with my reserve containers full, so I usually stop to fill them up at the last place on the way to the coast where fuel is not in shortage (GasBuddy is helpful for this). I top off the tank at every opportunity thereafter, provided evacuations are complete and I'm not using fuel that residents would otherwise need. I plan and limit my movements before the storm to conserve fuel. I try to save all reserves for the trip out after the storm, though sometimes I've been forced to use some before then. So far, I've made it out of all intercepts with plenty of fuel to spare.