Alberta Storm Chazers find beauty, science, community in clouds

You know that when the environment Canada tells you that a storm is coming and to stay away from it?

There is a group of people located in Alberta who find their happy place in the eyes of a storm, not a safe distance from it.

Matt Melneques comes from his love for its clouds. As an airline pilot, he regularly flies between them.

“I am always fascinated by the clouds,” Melnequin told CBC News in an interview.

“How he looks like cauliflower, why does it look like a silk? When you see them in a storm, there are many different parts. You have wall clouds, shelf clouds, commulonimbus clouds.

Melneques have been chasing for more than 15 years.

“I am part of a group called Team Dominar Canada. It is a Canadian version of professional storm chaser in states.”

Mark Simpson is in the same team, but with another purpose.

“My focus is mainly collecting science data so that we can improve the response time for Torrendos,” simpasson explained.

“Other members do photography, protect, and some other sciences.”

Simpson, who is not a pilot, stumbled into his passion about 30 years ago in 1996.

“I think when I saw the first twister film, I joined it,” he said, with laughter.

“I always had a passion for this and when I went to Canada, I came to know that I have a tornado nearby so I decided to know how to chase. I got an opportunity to go to America due to the need to get data. I have used the skills that I have in electronics, so I can make a sensor that I can make a censor in a target.”

During summer, especially in July, Simpson is busy.

It is about four days, then three days to analyze videos and data.

He said, “We ourselves are a bit from research. We are not affiliated to the university. This allows us to do some things that others consider to be a little extreme,” he said.

But working outside the world of academics also has its own advantages.

“He said, science stands on its own. You can either do it and reach that goal, or not. We do more but it is fine. Some work we do is quite sophisticated, it is new, and the goods are not being done in universities.”

The goal is to publish the work, but also a public safety piece.

“Many people monitor social media to see where bad weather is going to be a hit, so we try to place the storm, the direction in which it is moving forward, the kind of things that are moving.”

Simpson said that a good size storm can attract about 30 to 40 chasers.

Meanwhile, for the pilot with one side of one side, it is about capturing one partition of magic.

“I like to go there and put myself in a situation where I can really get a good photo and come home with postcards,” said Melanik.

“When I got my first lightening photo, I was immediately bent.”