Chasing Hurricanes, Online and Off

Aug. 25, 2000 -- Not everyone is unhappy about the arrival of hurricane season.

When there are 100-mph winds raging around him, “I feel like I’m in my element,” explains Richard Horodner.

Horodner says he’s been in every hurricane to hit North America since 1965 — except Hurricane Camille, which struck in 1969 as he was getting married.

While most people in hurricane-affected areas grit their teeth for another few months of worrying about their property and safety, hurricane enthusiasts are breaking out their storm charts, flocking to Internet weather sites, and in some cases preparing to chase the storms to experience them firsthand.

Horodner says it’s a combination of scientific fascination and the rollercoaster-like thrill ride, as well as the satisfaction of chasing an elusive, fast-moving prey.

“The chase is a sport,” he says. “There’s a real skill to getting to that core alive.”

He admits, though, “Some people say, ‘That guy’s got to be stupid.’”

Horodner says he supports his hurricane habit by filming the storms and selling the tapes. His Web site (see links on the right) also offers “Hurricane Chase” tours.

Catching the Storm on the Net

Not every hurricane buff feels compelled to put himself in the eye of the storm, though.

Some, like amateur meteorologist Robert Brookens, gather information and plot the storm’s movement and development from home, and post their findings on the Web.

When a storm with hurricane potential starts brewing, Brookens, known on his Web site as “Barometer Bob,” positions himself in his office command center in his north Florida house, with access to satellite TV, the Weather Channel, the Internet, weather radio reports, and a wall-sized chart of the Pacific Ocean, he says.

Brookens, a forklift operator, says he leaves the actual forecasting to the professionals — primarily the National Hurricane Center. He prefers to focus on compiling information and making educated guesses about what a storm will do.

“I don’t do forecasts; I do scenarios,” he says.

Even though Brookens, who says he’s been in about five hurricanes starting with Hurricane David in 1975, doesn’t want to put himself in the line of another one, the experience of the storms’ fury has stayed with him.

To get an idea of the experience, he says, “Think about the split moment you were scared the most in your entire life, and have that last 12 to 18 hours.”

‘Will It Be a Monster or a Wimp?’Gary Padgett, a mathematician in southern Alabama, says he was hooked by hurricanes as a kid, even to the point of writing the National Weather Service for storm tracking maps every year. “I don’t know … something grabbed me. I just started following the storms,” he says.

There are other powerful weather phenomena, like major winter storms, but trackers like Padgett say there’s something special about hurricanes.

“A hurricane has all this potential of what it can do, but so few of them act on it,” he explains. With each new storm brewing, Padgett wonders, “Is this one going to be a real monster or a wimp?”

“Everybody has something that intrigues them, I guess,” says Padgett.

Todd Kimberlain, who is now studying for a Ph.D in atmospheric sciences, says he used to take weather data and write his own advisories as a kid growing up in southern Florida.“I was just watching the news one night and I saw this big swirl on the map, and that was it,” he says.

George Sciaffino, a systems information manager in New Orleans who operates George’s Hurricane Page, says he has always enjoyed tracking the storms, and like other hurricane buffs, he looks forward to hurricane season all year.

“I just bought a house, so I guess I’m kind of crazy,” he says with a laugh.