Scientists are getting good at predicting tornados – their spawning, their trajectory, and even the estimated damage. The time has gone up from 3 minutes to 14 when it comes to the creation of one. 14 minutes is enough to get your things and get to the shelter but doesn’t leave a lot of wiggle room. Especially when you think about the rural areas that tornados often hit.
But they want to do better at understanding why some storms spawn tornados while others don’t. And that’s why researchers from CU Boulder spent this past spring using drones to fly into the center of major storm cells and tornados. They
The goal? A better understanding of why tornados form, and ultimately a faster prediction system.
The United States sees about 75% of the tornados that form every year, with Canada usually picking up the rest. The flat plains that are in the middle of the US are the perfect meeting grounds for the cold air streams from the north, and hot air currents from the south. Huge storms happen when they meet.
This year was an especially good year to conduct their research, which will also take place next spring. The US saw over 300 tornados touch down across the country, causing millions of dollars in damage and the loss of at least 8 lives. Better prediction systems could mean future lives are saved.
Scientists aren’t exactly sure why tornados happen. They understand the science behind them, but when it comes to the reasons one mega storm will spawn tornados while another, very similar storm, will not produce one isn’t clear.
The reason it is so hard to answer these questions is that you can’t force a storm to pop up places. Monitoring equipment doesn’t usually move, so you place it somewhere storms usually happen and hope it spawns. If it doesn’t, well, you don’t get your data.
But Colorado scientists had a new idea: drones.
The use of drones in science isn’t new, but this is an interesting application. Researchers will join storm chasers to find supercell storms that could spawn tornados, and fly their drones into the fray.
The vehicles they’re driving will be equipped with monitoring systems, but they will also be launching drones with even more equipment to really understand what is going on.
The huge team of researchers worked from May 13th through June 16th this year, with plans to go out next year and try again. Each day was filled with the same – wake up in a hotel, figure out where the next storm is going to be, and go after it.
Data is being analyzed now, but they are confident this process will teach them a lot about the way tornados form and how to better predict their movements.
