Into the Storm: Violent Tornadoes, Killer Hurricanes, and Death-defying Adventures in Extreme Weather
Long before he was one of the stars of the TV series Storm Chasers, Timmer was no stranger to the thrill and danger of storm chasing. Ever since he was in college in the late 1990s, studying meteorology, he was drawn to tornadoes, hurricanes, and other big-weather phenomena. This book, which will unavoidably remind some readers of the movie Twister, is a mixture of autobiography and edge-of-your-seat adventure. Timmer tells us with almost breathless enthusiasm about tracking Hurricane Floyd as it approached the U.S. in 1999; about following Katrina in 2005 and helping its victims in the aftermath; and about, in 2000, barely escaping a potentially lethal hailstorm. The author also takes us through the history of storm chasing, which began with a University of Oklahoma project in the early 1970s in which meteorology students filmed tornadoes to learn how they behaved. For fans of “extreme weather” adventures, this is a must-read. --David Pitt