AMS spoke with author Hank Schyma to talk about his new book, Storm: Chasing Nature’s Wildest Weather. Schyma is a storm chaser, musician, and filmmaker known for his weather photography, nature documentaries, educational science videos, and cinematic music. Over three decades of chasing storms, he has documented some of the world’s most extreme tornadoes and thunderstorms.
In 1995, he founded the retro surf-punk rock band Southern Backtones and worked as a photographer between musical gigs. Devotion to live music performances and multiple recordings continues, but in 2013, Schyma switched priorities from music to the documentation of severe weather. Always on call for photogenic storm opportunities, he hunts storms around the year and around the globe, from Tornado Alley to Argentina to the Northern Territory of Australia. His extensive experience and success documenting supercells and tornadoes with stable videography has led to multiple collaborations with atmospheric scientists, and he is credited with the discovery of a new transient luminous event coined a “green ghost.”
Why do this book?
I suppose it’s one of those things you do because you can.
Who is it for?
It’s for all walks of nature lovers, especially severe-weather nuts.
What obstacles did you face?
Capturing photos of all the weather elements required was a three-decade obstacle, but obviously a fun and rewarding journey. Simplifying the science and physics behind all the different storm elements so that beginners could understand while keeping it accurate was very challenging as well. Initially there were 12 or so pages walking readers through tornadogenesis. That got boiled down to six pages, including all of the diagrams and photos.
What surprised you?
It was a mountain of work, but I was surprised overall how easy it was to write a thick book. Of course it would have been much more difficult if I didn’t have climate scientist Anton Seimon and lightning scientist Tom Warner on quick dial. But writing chase accounts and explaining physics is much easier to me than writing fiction or song lyrics.
What are the implications of this work?
The overarching theme is the appreciation and respect for our atmosphere dovetailed with the dire importance of critical thinking and scientific methodology. Especially these days.
Where do you go from here?
Since my entire weather portfolio is in this book, I’m calculating it could take another 30 years for the sequel. So for now I think I’d like to try my hand at a science fiction novel and continue attempting to track down and photograph my first gigantic jet.
