Owen,
Theres a marvelous article in the national geographic a few months back about some Chasers who got chased. Gives you an idea how very dangerous it can be. Tornadoes are rarely as wide as that one was, but still. Worth a stop at the library. I should think the main danger would be all these other guys hurtling around country roads talking on their cell phones and looking at the sky. I wonder how many storm chasers have been killed in roadway accidents. Penny and I got caught in a storm in Clayton a few years back that was a outflow boundary rather than a tornado, although in the early stages of an outflow boundary they can look the same. I want to tell you when you have one of those things coming at you down a road with no sideturns, its pretty hard to think straight. The Official instructions for what to do if you cant find shelter, is to get out of the car and jump in the ditch. We pulled over as the thing came on and I looked out the window beside the car. The ditch had two feet of water and hail slush. No way I was getting in there. I called my friend in the weather bureau and asked him what he would have done. He said, I wouldnt have been there. So, now that I have had that advice, I will probably never drive into a tornado watch area again. Nick Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ From: Friam [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Owen Densmore Sent: Friday, April 04, 2014 9:33 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] tornado discussion Like whale watching, there are folks who track down and watch tornados. Have you ever tried it? Probably pretty dangerous, but who knows, maybe not. It would be fascinating! -- Owen On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 9:21 PM, Nick Thompson <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: Dear Friammers, Its almost May, the season in which I provide posts on tornadoes and the rest of you dopeslap me for my naïve interest in them. A true sign of spring, this message is. I offer for your amusement the following: http://www.americanwx.com/bb/index.php/topic/43293-tornado-in-michoacan-mexi co/ It contains two videos of an urban tornado in Mexico, the second of which (marked NASA) is by far the longest, steadiest portrait of a tornado I have ever seen. There are many mysterious aspects of this storm --- the high base, the innocent sky, the absence of any lightning, or even any precipitation in the region all seem strange. I considered that it was a hoax of some sort, but there is yet a third video of this same storm, taken from another angle, and in this case, the video takers have to take shelter from falling stuff. Another feature of this storm that makes it exciting is that it picks up long strands of agricultural debris (plastic row covers, perhaps?) which have the effect of visualizing the circulation of the storm outside the dustcolumn that we normally think of as the tornado. One of the thing that makes tornadoes seem so implausible is that the column itself often seems quite strand-like and delicate. Please let me know what you think. N Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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