First Road Trip of the summer in effect! I’ve been very interested in Storm Chasing as a sub culture for a while. Lots of storm chasers these days. Steven Coy is just 21 years old, but already an experienced storm chaser. We join Steven in his hometown of Stover Missouri, and on his family’s farm which turns out to be a great place to chase a storm. In Missouri Storm Chaser Steven Coy-Podcast 634.

Storm Chasing Ground Zero

As Wall Street is to finance, Hollywood is to the film industry, Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma are to storm chasing. OU student and avid chaser Steven Coy is deceptively young. I say deceptively because his experience and knowledge become obvious in this podcast.

An Interview and a Storm to Chase

Steven Coy talks about his interest in storm chasing. His heroes. Missouri Storm Chasers FaceBook page is over eighty thousand strong these days. No hype on the FB page. Just good content to let people know about potential threats. Stover is in a ‘blind spot’ for radars at regional centers. Storm chasers like Coy perform a service for locals.

They Call Him The Weatherman

It is Saturday. Mobile Podcast Command is parked at the local storage facility on the west side of Stover, Missouri. Steven and his mom show up for the interview. After, the Coys invite me out to the family homestead a few miles outside of town. Not wanting to impose, I decline. A few minutes later they are back. In Missouri Storm Chaser Steven Coy-Podcast 634.

Chasing On Foot

Ok, off 6 miles down the road. Then a gravel road. Then a rutted driveway. A few hundred feet more. Twenty minutes later we are out by the shed. Here on the back 40, or the front 40 if you take Steven’s mom’s word for it. A vista from which to chase “on foot” as Steven says. This is where he takes a lot of photographs.

Coy Delivers

With a practiced eye and a little help from an extensive radar application on his phone, Coy precisely predicts the path of the storm. It will come right to us he says. When the storm hits, right on schedule, we head for the horse barn to take cover and take pictures. Steven measures wind velocity at 78.5 miles per hour. I thought the building was about to come down. He calls it in to the weather service. They sound skeptical. Later we hear about damage in a nearby town consistent with that windspeed.

I get an education about the nature of these thunderstorms, what causes tornados and how they form. When the storm clears, it’s time to wrap it up. From here it’s onto Oklahoma, and more hail. Thanks to Steven and the Coy family for making sure I was safe during the storm. There’s a lot of unwarranted criticism these days of young people. Steven Coy is one young person doing what he loves and learning everyday. By the way, Steven’s mom days if you leave their house hungry, it’s your own damn fault!

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Missouri Storm Chaser Steven Coy-Podcast 634

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