Vortex

Part One Chapter One

Iris ran out to her car, an old 2009 periwinkle Toyota Rav4, and started her normal pre chase setup. She made sure the mesonet was installed and functional, she checked that her satellite internet was connected, and she made sure her car could survive the drive from Illinois to Tennessee. Iris was a storm chaser, who specifically tried to chase tornadoes. She was part of a small indie chase team called MesoTrack, whose goal was to find and track violent weather to improve warning. This was a little speech that Iris had come up with for the team to help market themselves to others. The team also live streamed their chases to raise money to support themselves. Iris was the more independent vehicle of the team. She and her girlfriend Abie drive ahead of the team to try to keep ahead of the storm and warn nearby towns. Markus and Jack drove the van, the team's main vehicle. A big ford transit van loaded with scientific instruments that would track the storm motion. Finally Velvette and Drew, who drove the truck, an old 1998 Dodge Dakota, would drive into the path of the storm to deploy data collection pods that measured the wind, pressure, temperature, and humidity at the ground inside a tornado. If all went well, the team would end up with great footage, a dataset, and no casualties. Iris packed her bag into the back of her car and started off towards the team's meeting place, Peoria IL. From there, she and the team would caravan down to their target area for the next few days, Eastern Tennessee. Iris waved to her family before driving off to her next adventure.