Weather Gabe

Today, I’ll show you how to tell when a lowering has a real chance of producing a tornado.

For new storm chasers, one of the biggest challenges is knowing what you’re seeing. At first glance, it might seem easy—just look for clouds that resemble textbook images. But real storms rarely match the textbooks. A wall cloud that could produce a tornado can look very similar to a harmless lowering.

Understanding which lowerings have real tornado potential helps you position yourself for the best intercept, and it may even prevent you from missing a tornado.

The challenge? Telling these lowerings apart—even experienced chasers sometimes get it wrong, sometimes leading to missed opportunities.

Non-tornadic lowerings usually form near a downdraft.  Tornadic lowerings often develop where updrafts and downdrafts meet.

I’ll never forget it.  It was one of the saddest things I’ve seen while chasing.

May 4, 2003.  Dozens of chasers had pulled over...

Storm chasing has its thrilling moments—when a storm explosively breaks the cap, when you see a stunning supercell, or when a tornado intensifies right in front of you.

But anyone who’s chased for more than a season knows the reality: these moments are rare. Most of the time, you end up busting. Sometimes it’s due to a bad decision, other times it’s a muddy road. But usually, it’s just that the weather in your target area didn’t cooperate.

Recognizing these failure modes is crucial to avoiding them. Doing so can save you a lot of frustration and lead to more successful chases.

Chase failures can be caused by many factors, but most are tied to weather conditions. Even during a major outbreak, just one or two variables can turn a promising target storm into a bust. That’s why it’s crucial to understand which meteorological factors can ruin a chase day.

It's not always easy to pinpoint which weather factor caused a setup to fail....

 Happy August, Friend!  Hope it's been a good one so far.

It's fitting that just as the severe weather slowed down, Twisters was released. Naturally, I saw it opening weekend—and it was great!

This blog covers:

•  What Twisters got right
• When to stop to take tornado pics
• Why the Moore EF5 storm was so powerful

TWISTERS: 10 THINGS THE MOVIE GOT RIGHT

The movie is the sequel to the 1996 cult classic Twister. Since its release on July 19th, it has already grossed over $170 million at the box office. Because of its popularity, I thought it would be fun to review the movie from a chaser's perspective.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!

Here are 10 things I believe the movie nailed:

1. Forecasting tools - in the opening scene, Praveen is shown looking at the Storm Prediction Center Mesoanalysis page for forecasting—a realistic touch! Throughout the movie, storm chasers are often seen using Gibson Ridge radar software, which many...

Sometimes, it's hard to remember how you began.

And that's definitely true for long-time chasers. We sometimes forget how hard it was for us in the beginning. And when I started, I was really bad at it.  So I thought it might be helpful to tell how I became a chaser

For me, it all began in 1990. On May 15th, a powerful F3 tornado struck my hometown, Stillwater, OK.

After the tornado hit, I became fascinated with tornadoes. Trouble was, I didn't know where to find information about them. My mom suggested that I write the local weatherman, Gary England,  to see if he might be taking his tornado safety talk to town.

To my surprise, Gary wrote back. His letter arrived 3 weeks after I sent mine. He said that, sadly, he wouldn't be coming to Stillwater that year. But he gave me a copy of his book "Those Terrible Twisters and the Weather of Oklahoma"

That was when my obsession truly began. The book that Gary gave me had it all: tornado pics, dates, locations -- everything. I...