Matthew Crowther
EF4
The other night in TX I was watching what was happening regarding the situation that was going on SW and south of Dallas in regard to the well after dark tornadoes and was frankly appalled by how many people were attempting to chase "up close and personal". The number of SN icons right up next to intense circulations on radar was frankly astonishing to me- as was just the large amount of dots that were in the general area still actively chasing up until at least midnight. First of all: I fail to see what the appeal of chasing after dark in general is unless your aim is to photograph lightning. But every year I see more and more people continuing to chase until all hours of the night.
To me chasing is not a game where the sole goal is to be able to brag later on your twitter account or FB page or on this forum how many tornadoes you "bagged" even if they were only visible for split seconds illuminated by lightning. However, I seem to be in the minority in that regard because of how many people will doggedly follow a supposedly tornadic supercell or even a squall line until 2 or 3 AM even if it is a heavily forested area of somewhere like western AR. If these people were keeping a safe distance it would be one thing but a fair number were very very close- which is IMO a dangerous thing to do even in broad daylight especially if the storm is HP in nature- of course the tragedy and other near misses during the El Reno event is the prime example of that. You never know when a storm will do something you do not expect like produce a satellite tornado, or maybe the road will be blocked-there are a number of scenarios that will potentially reduce your margin of error to 0. With after dark supercells and also with the vast majority of HP storms the best view is from a safe distance anyway- what would you rather see? A shot of a murky low contrast tornado either only visible in the lightning or wrapped in rain or both, or the stunning spaceship/barber pole structure shots that have been seen the past week?
The other thing to note is that this is only April. A lot of people (like me) can only chase for a 1-4 week period every year and most of people in that boat will be out in May or June- I shudder to think what kind of road-clogging messes we well have on Memorial Day weekend if there is a big threat in a small area. So add to the list of dangers several hundred chase vehicles on one highway in the direct path of a monster storm.
The root cause of all this is the (in a lot of cases false) sense of security having real time radar in the vehicle gives to chasers. You can look at the radar, see where the couplet or little shear or TVS icon is in relation to your position and think that is safe to drive right up to it. This ability also allows people who have never chased at all or have very little experience think then can do things that are not really that safe even for someone who has been doing it for 20 or more years.
Bottom line: There was talk after El Reno how that was a "wake up call" but it seems to have had no effect at all on chaser behavior. The clock is ticking to the next inevitable chaser death(s).
To me chasing is not a game where the sole goal is to be able to brag later on your twitter account or FB page or on this forum how many tornadoes you "bagged" even if they were only visible for split seconds illuminated by lightning. However, I seem to be in the minority in that regard because of how many people will doggedly follow a supposedly tornadic supercell or even a squall line until 2 or 3 AM even if it is a heavily forested area of somewhere like western AR. If these people were keeping a safe distance it would be one thing but a fair number were very very close- which is IMO a dangerous thing to do even in broad daylight especially if the storm is HP in nature- of course the tragedy and other near misses during the El Reno event is the prime example of that. You never know when a storm will do something you do not expect like produce a satellite tornado, or maybe the road will be blocked-there are a number of scenarios that will potentially reduce your margin of error to 0. With after dark supercells and also with the vast majority of HP storms the best view is from a safe distance anyway- what would you rather see? A shot of a murky low contrast tornado either only visible in the lightning or wrapped in rain or both, or the stunning spaceship/barber pole structure shots that have been seen the past week?
The other thing to note is that this is only April. A lot of people (like me) can only chase for a 1-4 week period every year and most of people in that boat will be out in May or June- I shudder to think what kind of road-clogging messes we well have on Memorial Day weekend if there is a big threat in a small area. So add to the list of dangers several hundred chase vehicles on one highway in the direct path of a monster storm.
The root cause of all this is the (in a lot of cases false) sense of security having real time radar in the vehicle gives to chasers. You can look at the radar, see where the couplet or little shear or TVS icon is in relation to your position and think that is safe to drive right up to it. This ability also allows people who have never chased at all or have very little experience think then can do things that are not really that safe even for someone who has been doing it for 20 or more years.
Bottom line: There was talk after El Reno how that was a "wake up call" but it seems to have had no effect at all on chaser behavior. The clock is ticking to the next inevitable chaser death(s).
Last edited by a moderator:
