The TWISTEX team was tragically caught in the El Reno tornado in 2013, resulting in the deaths of three team members.
TWISTEX, which stands for Tactical Weather Instrumented Sampling in Tornadoes EXperiment, was a field research team dedicated to understanding tornadoes and increasing lead times for warnings. The team was well-known in the meteorological community and featured in the Discovery Channel series “Storm Chasers.”
On May 31, 2013, the team, including Tim Samaras, his son Paul Samaras, and colleague Carl Young, were conducting field research near El Reno, Oklahoma, when an EF3 tornado took an unexpected turn. The tornado rapidly expanded in size, becoming the widest tornado ever recorded at 2.6 miles across, and its speed and erratic path made it particularly dangerous.
The TWISTEX vehicle was overtaken by the tornado, and all three occupants were killed. This event marked one of the most significant losses to the storm chasing community and raised awareness about the dangers of tornado research. The tragedy led to increased discussions about safety protocols for storm chasers and researchers in the field. The contributions of the TWISTEX team to tornado research and the advancement of severe weather warnings have had a lasting impact on the field of meteorology.