Storm Chasers, Stay Home

[Jordan Overton]

Very interesting article, especially with today being the 3 year anniversary of El Reno:

http://www.slate.com/articles/healt...sing_is_dangerously_crowding_rural_roads.html

 

[Jeff Duda]

This guy is fairly opinionated. I'm sure there are those out there that agree with him and those that don't. I personally disagree with him even though I'm in the class of people he considers okay to be chasing.

This topic is basically on the level of light bars at this point. It'll advance with the technology, but until laws or the status quo changes, this issue will reappear year after year and most people likely will not feel any different from one year to the next.

 

[Todd Lemery]

I have a simple and very fair idea on how to resolve this. They need to pass laws that say only Todd Lemery is allowed to chase. Just like that the problem is solved and I think everyone is happy!

 

[Dan Robinson]

Here's my video to show how it really was at Dodge City.

 

[Kade Illian]

I do not agree with this article. While there is a problem with local residents trying to "chase" the tornado, I feel that this amount of storm chasers on the roads is fine. There are only hundreds to a couple thousand storm chasers AT THE MOST chasing these storms. This is only a fraction of the millions of people across the Midwest. There can be a problem when 50 storm chasers are on the same road all at close range to the tornado like at Dodge City the other day. Not that there is much storm chasers can do about that, but I can foresee a terrible incident at a road block where a tornado takes a sudden shift in motion and kills everybody that was trapped behind the roadblock.

 

[B. Dean Berry]

It's Slate. They always caterwaul about anything and everything. I'd not be shocked if they somehow also painted storm chasing as a patently sexist, racist, bigoted, homophobic activity.

Then again, I'll never know, even if they do, because it's Slate, and I refuse to click on the article, thus giving that leftist ladies' gossip magazine ad revenue.

 

[Ben Holcomb]

It's clickbait. Next?

 

[Marc R. O'Leary]

@Dan Robinson ...I'd like to commend you on your following distance. I wish all chasers had courtesy and common sense like this.

 

[Brian L. Russell]

I am still going to chase and in fact I am planning to move to Oklahoma within the next few days to be closer to the more tornado prone areas, plus it would be extremely nice to get as far away from the Chicago area as possible. in fact I would love to be able to achieve my goals of getting live video from inside a tornado and live to see it.

 

[Warren Faidley]

This subject is becoming increasingly boring and factually misaligned by the minute. As a journalist, my head is going to pop purple dust like in those ads for jet.com. No one ever mentions or addresses the main problem with traffic (locals) or the known trouble makers who have made (and continue to make) this an issue by promoting bad chasing behavior and ethics.

 

[Kade Illian]

Yes, I completely agree with Warren. The media loves to focus on the storm chasers and put them in a bad light, when often times it is the thousands of locals filming, escaping, and hopping out of their cars to photograph these storms. I don't know why this has not been made into more of an issue.

 

[rdale]

Because locals are out there storm chasing for the exact same reason non-locals are: to see the storm.

 

[Warren Faidley]

If I was a local I'd also want to see a tornado. The problem is that most writers almost never mention locals.

 

[Brett Roberts]

With regard to local yokels, one issue I have with the whitewashing mentality ("they have as much right to be there as you") is that it doesn't consider any differences in driving behavior between chasers vs. locals. From my observations, locals contribute disproportionately to problems with traffic flow during convergences near towns and cities. They are (anecdotally) much more likely to think they own the road, and that there's no issue with driving 25 mph under the speed limit with their kids and cell phones hanging out the window as dozens of vehicles line up behind them. To be fair, I have definitely also witnessed some chasers driving this way, but not very many. It only takes one entitled driver acting that way on a big storm to cause problems quickly, and once the local yokel element gets involved in the chase, you often see many people driving that way.

 

[rdale]

They say "storm chasers" usually - that means locals and non locals all in one. I don't think there is too much difference what state the license plate says if a road is blocked by too many storm watchers.