TWISTEX

TWISTEX (a backronym for Tactical Weather-Instrumented Sampling in/near Tornadoes EXperiment) was a tornado research experiment that was founded and led by Tim Samaras of Bennett, Colorado, US, that ended in the deaths of three researchers in the 2013 El Reno tornado. The experiment announced in 2015 that there were plans for future operations.

The research objectives were to better understand tornado generation, maintenance and decay processes and to gain insight and knowledge of the seldom sampled near-surface internal tornado environment. Progress on these research fronts was aimed toward increasing tornado warning lead time, while the internal tornado near-surface sampling provided essential ground truth data for structural engineering analysis of the interaction of tornadic winds with homes and buildings.

TWISTEX was one of the featured teams in seasons 3, 4 and 5 of Storm Chasers on the Discovery Channel. The group was also featured on National Geographic Channel's "Disaster Labs".

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