August 17, 2009
What software do storm chasers use to intercept a tornado?
Certified Storm Spotter SKYWARN asked:
How are they to know exactly where a hurricane will land? Where can I buy the software? Isn 't the doppler radar on the news? How to get 10 miles away or cloder it?
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How are they to know exactly where a hurricane will land? Where can I buy the software? Isn 't the doppler radar on the news? How to get 10 miles away or cloder it?
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Filed under Weather by kris
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Comments on What software do storm chasers use to intercept a tornado? »
It’s doppler radar, it’s very expensive and you can’t just buy the software!
They have all sorts of instrumentation, plus some storm chasers have a small doppler radar with them. They could also have direct communications with the national weather service and live doppler feeds from them. Plus if they have been doing it for some time now, they kinda develop a 6th sense to where a tornado is likely to strike.
If somebody actually marketed the software you describe, they’d be a billionaire…
While stormchasers use a variety of tools to aid them in their decision making process, it boils down to basic fundamental knowledge of weather, observation skills, and instinct. And even then, there is no guarantee that they will intercept a tornado.
I don’t know if others here have completely understood your question. Yes they use Doppler Radar…but every storm chaser doesn’t have their own. The NWS operates the Doppler Radar and that information is freely available to the public, either through the NWS site, other websites, or other more advanced software that makes the data viewable. Try this software:
You need to figure out some way to get internet while on the road, I use a broadband wireless card.
Once you have internet access, there’s a great piece of software called SwiftWX. If you have a GPS receiver connected to your computer it will plot your position on a Doppler radar display which shows where the tornado or mesocyclone is supposed to be located, as well as how fast it is moving, where large hail is, etc. That being said, the radar updates only come about every 10 minutes, which means the storm may move a long ways during that time. When I was out chasing this spring the storms were moving about 50 miles/hour, so in 10 minutes they would move 8 miles. You need to anticipate where they will be with respect to you.
Nobody can tell you where a tornado will touch down, but the radar can tell you where the center of rotation is for a storm, and the goal is usually to be to the south or southeast of that point.