Inside Tornadoes @ National Geographic
`Last June 11 Tim Samaras and two colleagues did the near impossible—they chased down a tornado and placed a probe with video cameras directly in its path. Beginning at precisely 2:23 p.m. the team caught images that have—in a breakthrough—made it possible to calculate wind speeds close to the ground, where tornadoes rip through human lives. Even after his team found the tornado and drove along a dirt road in Iowa to a place they were fairly certain lay in its path, Samaras remained unsure of where exactly he should leave the probe. He stood watching the tornado boil toward him, then, at the last second, he jogged over, hefted the 80-pound (40-kilogram) probe, and shifted it 40 feet (10 meters) to the north. Samaras guessed right: The eye passed just 10 feet (three meters) from the probe, giving the cameras the closest ever view of the fierce winds turning just off the ground around a tornado’s center.’
with some cool videos and pictures.
