Introduction and looking for advice

[Ryan Ingoglia]

Hello everyone,
I am new (meaning I have not yet done it) to actual storm chasing. I recently moved to Texas from Florida and now that the opportunities will present themselves more I would like to get into Storm Chasing. I have always has a fasination with weather and actually looked forward to hurricane season in Florida. Now that I am in Texas I would like to get the opportunity to see some real severe storms and possibly some tornados. My goal for chasing would be the obvious thrill of the catch as well as for photography. At this point I am looking for some good resources for learning more about tornadic formation and forcasting tools. I have a good understanding of hurricanes, but those are easy to predict compared to tornados. I am working on joining a local HAM group to get assistance with my HAM license and have found a few sites on the web didicated to the chase. Unfortunatly I am not quite at the point yet an need some of the fundimentals of weather patterns and prediction for now. Any assistance or refrences would be greatly appriciated.

Thanks,
Ryan

 

[Bob Schafer]

Welcome to our family, Ryan!

Go to severe weather workshops (or whatever they're called these days), read books, and read the internet! Here are a few links to get you "started":

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/severewx/glossary.php
http://theweatherprediction.com/
http://www.met.tamu.edu/class/ATMO151/tut/sound/soundmain.html
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/lmk/soo/docu/indices.php
http://www.rap.ucar.edu/weather/surface/stations.txt
http://www.srh.weather.gov/srh/jetstream/synoptic/ww_symbols.htm
http://weather.cod.edu/
http://www.nco.ncep.noaa.gov/pmb/nwprod/analysis/
http://www.wxcaster.com/models_main.htm
http://weather.msfc.nasa.gov/GOES/
http://weather.unisys.com/satellite/sat_sfc_map.html

Enough from me, I guess, LOL. That's about 10% of my wx-related bookmarks.

 

[Mikey Gribble]

I would order Tim's books, the Weather Forecasting Handbook and the Weather Map Handbook and start there (as long as you've already covered an intro. to meteorology book like Meteorology Today or are familiar with all the basics the book would cover).

 

[Brandon Sullivan]

well Bob pretty much summed it up man...

theweatherprediction is soo awesome!! Thats how I learned soo much..

My opinions..

for models-www.cod.edu/forecast and http://www.wxcaster.com/models_main.htm

for current items, and forecast svr products
www.spc.noaa.gov

You are on a good start being on Storm Track. It is an awesome sight. Have a good one man..


Brandon

 

[Tyler_Costantini]

I would look for someone close that has some experience that you can ride along with as well. I have taken a few people who are new, Some of them like it! Most of them are soooo darn bored they can’t stand it.

I also second reading all you can before 2008, So if you do find someone to ride with, you will have a basic knowledge of things.

 

[Doug Lee]

The "severe weather workshops" Bob mentioned are probably the Skywarn spotter training sessions, if that is what he was thinking of. Check the website of the National Weather Service office that serves your area. Usually, sometime in December, they will list the times and locations for the sessions.
Bob could have also been thinking of some of the conferences. In that case, keep an eye right here on this forum. I'm sure someone will post announcements as the info comes available. Most of these events take place from January thru March to prepare for the spring storm season.

 

[Tim Vasquez]

Yes, I have to second the recommendation of http://www.theweatherprediction.com/ (Jeff Haby, recently out of Mississippi State). Definitely check him out... he's got some first-rate material on there that complements the UCAR and NWS material.

Tim

 

[Tim Vasquez]

Oh... I have to also recommend John Weaver's The History of Thunderstorm Forecasting series.... a very unique perspective. You can find it here and here. As Mr. T said in "Be Somebody Or Be Somebody's Fool", you can't know where you're going if you don't know where you're from!

Tim

 

[David Drummond]

Tim's Storm Chasing Handbook offers a pretty darn good and thorough overview of storm chasing and would give you a firm foundation for developing yourself as a chaser.

http://www.weathergraphics.com/chasing/

 

[Jason Boggs]

Welcome Ryan! As others have said, StormTrack is a very good place to start and learn all you can. The weather prediction site that others have mentioned is a top notch site for learning about weather forecasting. Also be sure to read some of Chuck Doswell's essays which are located here http://www.cimms.ou.edu/~doswell/Essays_index.html


Also, I like to go to chasers websites and read their chase summaries to learn a little bit about the conditions of the day and what actually happened. I almost forgot, this is another great starting place for chasers which has a LOT of great reading material: http://www.k5kj.net/training.htm#Ethics

 

[Mike Krzywonski]

Some good instructional videos include The Art of Storm Chasing, Stormwatcher, Storm Structure 101 by Mike Hollingshead, StormWatch, & TESSA Super Storm Spotter. I don't know all the links off hand where these are available, but I'd order them if you're able to.

http://tessa.org/ is one of the links.

 

[Martin North]

Welcome Ryan!

Another usefull thing to do as well as what has already been suggested is to watch the nowcast threads during convective events as you can pick up quite a lot from observing what people are discussing and reporting as events unfold.

Decent radar access (such as GRL3 for instance) is almost essential for interpreting what is being discussed to something you can actually see (if not on the ground). It also gives you the chance to observe windfields via doppler so you can learn to spot areas of rotation etc...

 

[Matt Grans]

Wow! What a Great Thread!!! Thanks for all the links everyone! I'm definitely bookmarking this section.

 

[Laura Hedien]

Welcome. Be safe, get educated and don't pick up any bad habits from the "yahoos" out there. Align yourself with good chasers.
If something may seem like it's a bad idea, it probably is.
Have fun.
Did I mention be safe?
Laura

 

[W. Johansen]

Where in Texas are you? I have similar goals. I am in the Houston area.