Hi everybody,
I've long been interested in weather and especially tornadoes. I have been within a mile or two of at least four tornadoes, but have never actually seen one yet. I especially love learning about the 1967 Oak Lawn F4, where my grandma's uncle and cousin were among those killed at 95th & SW Highway, as well as the 1990 Plainfield F5, as I had many family members and friends in the area, and my grandma actually was forced to hunker down at the Joliet Mall, which the tornado came within a few hundred yards of obliterating. I could go on about my personal close calls, but I don't want to make this post too long.
I'm not going to chase this year as I don't have a vehicle, but my family will be traveling through the middle Plains (Nebraska and Kansas) as well as Colorado in the last two weeks of May so hopefully we'll catch something interesting! Slowly building up my gear and learning what I can until I can afford to chase in the meantime. I hope to soon be going to a school for civil engineering with a minor in meteorology, so I can truly understand the terrifying damage potential of tornadoes and other freaks of nature, if you will.