Long before Reed Timmer, Josh Wurman and Sean Casey hit the rainy roads with cameras in hand to capture the world’s most terrifying storms, there was David K. Hoadley, the American man credited with inventing storm chasing as we know it.
1
Growing up Bismarck, North Dakota, Hoadley’s interest in extreme weather began similar to other Midwestern weather enthusiasts — witnessing a thunderstorm so extreme that would make even your dad, standing tall with his hands on his hips on your front porch, run down into the basement.
2
"A storm came through the city one evening and took out the electricity for most of the city," Hoadley, now in his mid-80s, recalled to ‘USA Today' back in 2015. “I was very impressed with the damage that was done. So I decided I had to learn more about it. I was curious."
3
And follow that curiosity he did. After spending his college years chasing local storms and even briefly serving as a Lieutenant in the U.S. Army ROTC — where he opted to be stationed right in the heart of Tornado alley — Hoadley founded Storm Track, the first magazine dedicated to storm chasing.
4
While he ultimately passed off his role as editor 1986, handing the honor to fellow pioneering storm chaser Tim Marshall, Hoadley continued following storms — which he still does to this day.
5
During his sit down with USA Today, Hoadley, who is widely heralded as the forefather of storm chasing, got candid about his stats, revealing that since his first storm season in the late 1950s, he had witnessed 231 tornadoes, driving roughly 750,000 miles along the way.
6
While it’s unclear how many more tornadoes he’s seen in the years since his sit down— likely many considering he was back on the road days after the interview — one thing is certain: His passion for extreme weather isn’t going anywhere any time soon.
7
"Storm chasing is not that different, it's just that the tornadoes are ephemeral, brief events but also something you can remember months or even years later," he said.
