For scientists, amateur weather enthusiasts, or anyone intrigued or terrified by a darkening sky, this book provides not only a history of tornado research, but a vivid look into the origin of the storms. 67 color illustrations.

Short writings.

Dream trip? Or a nightmare of trouble? When Hannah Gruen inherits a farm from a distant cousin, the Drews, with Bess and George, drive off for a scenic Oklahoma vacation. The plan is to sell the property and pack up whatever mementos Hannah wants to keep. But a terrifying encounter with a tornado is just the beginning of trouble. In a duffel bag Nancy discovers what looks like a ransom note—and a gruff intruder appears, insisting that the bag is his! Is he planning a kidnapping? Nancy contacts the local police, but they think it’s a prank. When charming Derek Owens, a tornado chaser at the local university, offers to help, Nancy accepts faster than a lightning flash. But the clues she discovers lead her deeper into peril, and Nancy’s soon fighting for her life—in the eye of a monster storm!

From surreal skyscapes to wholesale destruction: the most dramatic scenes from the natural world. The destructive power of nature has always been a source of fear and fascination, and never more so than now, when climate change and extreme weather conditions are constantly in the news. Across the central United States, the infamous storms of Tornado Alley are fueled by the collision of cold fronts from Canada and warm fronts from the Gulf of Mexico. People have been chasing these storms for decades in pursuit of thrilling experiences, but now a new generation of storm chasers is combining scientific knowledge with powerful images. This book follows Mike Hollingshead and Eric Nguyen on seventeen chases through Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and South Dakota, illustrating the unfolding events with sequential shots and a running commentary by the chasers themselves. These spectacular storm portfolios are expanded with special features on weather phenomena like hail and mammatus clouds plus insights into forecasting and research.

These widely acclaimed essays from the author of Infinite Jest -- on television, tennis, cruise ships, and more -- established David Foster Wallace as one of the preeminent essayists of his generation. In this exuberantly praised book -- a collection of seven pieces on subjects ranging from television to tennis, from the Illinois State Fair to the films of David Lynch, from postmodern literary theory to the supposed fun of traveling aboard a Caribbean luxury cruiseliner -- David Foster Wallace brings to nonfiction the same curiosity, hilarity, and exhilarating verbal facility that has delighted readers of his fiction, including the bestselling Infinite Jest.

When disaster strikes, the only thing you can count on is yourself! Wyatt Anderson isn't thrilled that his prissy cousin is visiting his family's Oklahoma ranch. But it turns out Wyatt has bigger problems to deal with when a pair of dueling tornadoes lock the prairie in their sights....Wyatt, Alison, and neighbors Joshua and Jackson have nowhere to run. And when the old barn is battered by the tornadoes' ferocious winds, the animals that live inside are in danger. Will Wyatt and his friends risk their own lives to protect them?

What is tornado alley and where in the world is it? Why are tornados called "twisters"? This dynamic title answers these questions and more as readers discover what tornadoes look like, how, when, and where they most often form, how scientists predict and track them, and the safety steps they can take before, during, and after a tornado touches down

The author profiles real tornadoes and severe weather patterns over six thousand miles of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska, known as Tornado Alley.

One of the earliest sources of humanity's religious impulse was severe weather, which ancient peoples attributed to the wrath of storm gods. Enlightenment thinkers derided such beliefs as superstition and predicted they would pass away as humans became more scientifically and theologically sophisticated. But in America, scientific and theological hubris came face-to-face with the tornado, nature's most violent windstorm. Striking the United States more than any other nation, tornadoes have consistently defied scientists' efforts to unlock their secrets. Meteorologists now acknowledge that even the most powerful computers will likely never be able to predict a tornado's precise path. Similarly, tornadoes have repeatedly brought Americans to the outer limits of theology, drawing them into the vortex of such mysteries as how to reconcile suffering with a loving God and whether there is underlying purpose or randomness in the universe. In this groundbreaking history, Peter Thuesen captures the harrowing drama of tornadoes, as clergy, theologians, meteorologists, and ordinary citizens struggle to make sense of these death-dealing tempests. He argues that, in the tornado, Americans experience something that is at once culturally peculiar (the indigenous storm of the national imagination) and religiously primal (the sense of awe before an unpredictable and mysterious power). He also shows that, in an era of climate change, the weather raises the issue of society's complicity in natural disasters. In the whirlwind, Americans confront the question of their own destiny-how much is self-determined and how much is beyond human understanding or control.

The saga of the greatest tornado chaser who ever lived: a tale of obsession and daring and an extraordinary account of humanity’s high-stakes race to understand nature’s fiercest phenomenon from Brantley Hargrove, “one of today’s great science writers” (The Washington Post). At the turn of the twenty-first century, the tornado was one of the last true mysteries of the modern world. It was a monster that ravaged the American heartland a thousand times each year, yet science’s every effort to divine its inner workings had ended in failure. Researchers all but gave up, until the arrival of an outsider. In a field of PhDs, Tim Samaras didn’t attend a day of college in his life. He chased storms with brilliant tools of his own invention and pushed closer to the tornado than anyone else ever dared. When he achieved what meteorologists had deemed impossible, it was as if he had snatched the fire of the gods. Yet even as he transformed the field, Samaras kept on pushing. As his ambitions grew, so did the risks. And when he finally met his match—in a faceoff against the largest tornado ever recorded—it upended everything he thought he knew. Brantley Hargrove delivers a “cinematically thrilling and scientifically wonky” (Outside) tale, chronicling the life of Tim Samaras in all its triumph and tragedy. Hargrove takes readers inside the thrill of the chase, the captivating science of tornadoes, and the remarkable character of a man who walked the line between life and death in pursuit of knowledge. The Man Who Caught the Storm is an “adrenaline rush of a tornado chase…Readers from all across the spectrum will enjoy this” (Library Journal, starred review) unforgettable exploration of obsession and the extremes of the natural world.