RIP Tim Samaras, Paul Samaras and Carl Young

[jbhtexas]

This is very sad (as is all of the other destruction from the storms).

My wife and I were big fans of Storm Chasers. I was always quite surprised when watching SC that many folks were using what appears to be small, stock FWD cars to obtain storm data (fuel costs I guess). Do these cars have roll cages, safety harnesses, or any non-stock safety features?

In SC, Samaras and Young were using what appeared to be a 1-ton (or larger) 4WD, but I guess they didn't have that on Friday. I know they don't intend to get caught, but if something does happen where you have to take a ditch, blow through a fence, and head across a field or pasture to get out of the way, you have virtually no chance of doing that in a small car.

 

[Wesley]

Three or four storm chase vehicles were in the wrong place for this series of tornadic weather. Really bad day for all.

 

[FDWxMan]

This is very sad (as is all of the other destruction from the storms).

My wife and I were big fans of Storm Chasers. I was always quite surprised when watching SC that many folks were using what appears to be small, stock FWD cars to obtain storm data (fuel costs I guess). Do these cars have roll cages, safety harnesses, or any non-stock safety features?

In SC, Samaras and Young were using what appeared to be a 1-ton (or larger) 4WD, but I guess they didn't have that on Friday. I know they don't intend to get caught, but if something does happen where you have to take a ditch, blow through a fence, and head across a field or pasture to get out of the way, you have virtually no chance of doing that in a small car.

I think a lot of questions are going to be raised out of this, a lot of them much-needed, and some probably a bit of an overreach. We don't know the exact circumstances with Tim, Paul and Carl, so who knows at this point what went wrong, or what choices were correctly or incorrectly made.

But as many, myself included, have noted this week, too many people are getting too close, and doing things irresponsibly.

The "thrill seekers" getting close for the sake of getting close....people "chasing" claiming to help with spotting and such, yet have cameras focused in on their faces, there to become youtube heroes, and the "storm chaser chasers," following SKYWARN or vehicles with instrumentation to get close are helping creating the gridlock that is becoming more and more dangerous.

I lifted the following from twitter, but what other field would that be ok?
Imagine if we had the average Joe following volcanologists around to see who can get the closest pic inside the crater to the lava dome?

Or if people were chasing firefighters into burning test buildings to see who could get the coolest pic or closest to the backdraft.

 

[stormchaser2014]

I always looked forward to meeting him someday and really wish that I could have.

 

[stormchaser2014]

The other members of the TWISTEX crew will be on CNN at 8pm

 

[RustyClone]

It always seemed to me when I watched Storm Chasers and the other stuff on Discovery that Tim and his crew were the safe ones.

 

[Wesley]

It always seemed to me when I watched Storm Chasers and the other stuff on Discovery that Tim and his crew were the safe ones.

They were. ...except in an EF-5.....