With the spring severe weather season upon us, we sat down with Meteorologist Morgan Strackbein to see how much work goes into tracking tornadoes and wild weather.
MOLINE, Ill. — As the spring severe weather season gets underway, Storm Track 8 Meteorologist Morgan Strackbein said tracking tornadoes is one of the most difficult and stressful parts of the job and far less straightforward than many viewers might think.
“Any meteorologist that’s on TV, if you ask them what is the most stressful part of the job, it is going to be tracking severe weather, specifically tracking tornadoes,” Strackbein said.
Despite advances in radar technology, meteorologists cannot definitively confirm a tornado using radar alone. Instead, they rely on a combination of radar data and real-world reports.
“There’s no way, shape or form for us to be able to actually confirm that a tornado is on the ground,” Strackbein said. “We’re working in conjunction a lot with National Weather Service, storm chasers, storm spotters, people who are in the area because you need an actual confirmation that somebody, yes, has seen a tornado.”
When reading the radar and data, it’s not as though the screens tell the meteorologists where to look or where a tornado might be. Instead, the team is sifting through maps and radar and data, looking at what all of the clues combined add up to.
Meteorologists analyze radar signatures such as velocity, which can show rotation. They also look for tight “couplets,” or areas where winds are moving rapidly in opposite directions. Mets also examine correlation coefficient data, which can indicate debris in the air, a potential sign that a tornado is actually on the ground.
“If we see a drop in that, that means there’s a lot of big objects in the atmosphere that the radar is picking up,” Strackbein said. “It could be hail, but if it’s a really concentrated area, it could be picking up a lot of dirt, dust, trees, branches. All those kinds of things that can also indicate a tornado’s on the ground.”
Even with those indicators, confirmation often comes later. Some tornadoes occur in rural areas and go unreported until National Weather Service teams conduct damage surveys the following day.
“It’s a very intricate process. It’s extremely difficult,” Strackbein said.
Inside the newsroom, meteorologists continuously scan radar feeds, cycling through multiple data products while tracking storm movement and estimating arrival times for communities in a storm’s path.
“We’re clicking through, we’re looking, we’re trying to peek through, we’re using all our different elements,” she said. “We also have to kind of pay attention to what the storm motion is, how fast it’s moving, how slow it’s moving.”
During major weather events, stations often assign multiple staff members to cover different tasks. But at times, such as overnight or weekend shifts, a single meteorologist may handle everything from analyzing radar to communicating live on air and monitoring reports from the field and social media.
“I’m sitting here, I’m trying to sift through all the different elements, and then I’m also trying to pay attention to posts from social media and also making sure I’m keeping up with the National Weather Service,” Strackbein said.
That collaboration with the National Weather Service is critical, she added, noting that agency staff focus solely on analysis while broadcasters relay information to the public.
“They really are good with us to make sure we get the word out faster,” she said.
Strackbein has also experienced severe weather firsthand while storm chasing, though she cautions against untrained individuals attempting it.
“I would never suggest anyone to go storm chasing unless they have some sort of background knowledge,” she said. “I am in the back seat and I have a driver, and I am trying to make sure I have an exit point at all times.”
In some cases, she has been among the first to confirm a tornado on the ground. It’s a responsibility she described as both challenging and critical.
“This is very life-saving information that we’re trying to give out here,” she said.
As the region transitions out of La Niña conditions, which can increase severe weather activity, Strackbein encouraged viewers to understand the pressure meteorologists face during outbreaks.
“Try to give them compassion,” she said. “It is a very high-stress situation.”
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