AccuWeather spoke with storm chaser Reed Timmer, who is out chasing tornado-warned storms threatening the southern United States on Jan. 9.
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00:00 When it comes to severe weather, there's no one that we trust more to take us along for the ride,
00:03 along for the chase and break it all down than extreme meteorologist Dr. Reed Timmer.
00:07 Reed is joining us live right now. Reed, I have to imagine you are heading
00:11 towards some of these cells with the squall line.
00:13 Yeah, I'm actually in the path of that southern confirmed tornado, so it should be at my location
00:20 here. Maybe at about five or six minutes, I think it's moving rapidly about 70 miles an hour.
00:25 I'm along I-10 just to the northeast of Alford, and this is moving northeast rapidly.
00:30 And this also produced a tornado earlier as well. Then off to the north of I-10 is an even
00:36 stronger tornado, a longer track one that is in progress too. You can see the debris that's
00:41 getting lofted on radar. You can definitely see the TDS. And these are different than the
00:45 renegade supercells earlier. These are embedded within the squall line. So this is that quasi
00:50 linear convective system that we talk about so often when you get the tornadoes embedded within
00:54 the line. They're wrapped in rain, moving very fast and pretty dangerous. And honestly, it's
00:59 difficult to stay ahead of this line. I'm going about 70 miles an hour, and the line is catching
01:05 me rapidly from behind. You know, Reed, I have to mention something. You just mentioned how these
01:10 cells within our squall line are often rain wrapped. It makes them really hard to see,
01:14 or these tornadoes, I should say, makes them really hard to see. And look, you're an expert.
01:19 You do this for a living. But for the average person who's having to deal with the severe
01:23 weather, it's so important that they take those warnings really seriously, right?
01:28 Yeah, it's very important to take those warnings seriously. There are legitimate damage causing
01:34 tornadoes inside of these lock boxes today. In fact, there's one that's approaching me
01:39 from behind right now. You can see these big winds and squalls. And this is what it looks like before
01:44 an arrival of one of these tornadoes that's embedded in the squall line. It's near white
01:48 out condition that suddenly you see debris whipping around, changing wind directions rapidly,
01:53 or vehicle bounces up and down if it doesn't get rolled. And that's part of the danger of driving
01:58 down the interstate here on I-10 with this tornado-worn squall line moving right along it as
02:03 well. You know, Reed, I have to ask you, you know, from your perspective as a storm chaser,
02:07 as this is approaching you, you've been telling us it's catching up to you pretty quickly.
02:11 What comes next as this catches up to you? What do you do in terms of your steps as the storm
02:17 approaches? Well, I'm going to try to gain visual of it. Once this gust front goes by,
02:22 the tornado should be hiding right behind it. So I'm looking for wind shifts. I'm looking for
02:27 debris as well. I'll probably try to stay ahead of the circulation, of course, to not try to get
02:31 impacted by it, which would be a safety violation out here. But definitely will stay ahead of the
02:36 tornado, try to get visual of it, and then report that tornado in progress so that people can take
02:41 shelter down the line with this 70-mile-an-hour moving tornado.
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