What It Takes to Be a Storm Chaser

Garbed in pajamas, snow boots and his winter coat, 12-year-old Nikhil Trivedi was sitting under the roof of a gazebo in the dark. It was 5:30 a.m. and snow was falling in Washington, D.C. Trivedi’s makeshift weather monitoring station consisted of three simple materials: a ruler, a laptop and a small, metal side table.

Nikhil Trivedi

Following his own procedure, Trivedi dragged the side table into his backyard, plopped down under a canopy, and measured the snowfall depth on the metal table, recording the time and number of inches each hour. Passion and enthusiasm are both prerequisites to replicate the true Trivedi method.

Trivedi brought these qualities with him to UW–Madison, where today he is a rising senior majoring in atmospheric and oceanic sciences. While his tools may have evolved since those rudimentary backyard experiments, his curiosity and passion for research were born in those early days of scientific exploration.

“Scientific curiosity is critical to success in the field. It drives you, and Nikhil has that,” says Stephanie Henderson, assistant professor in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences (AOS).

Henderson first met Trivedi in the fall 2023 semester as a sophomore in her Dynamics of the Atmosphere and Oceans course, a class usually taken by juniors and seniors. His intelligent questions and affable demeanor quickly made an impression. Henderson eventually recommended Trivedi for the William M. Lapenta Student Internship with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a 10-week program Trivedi completed last summer. He traveled to Miami to study with NOAA’s Hurricane Research Division (HRD) in the Atlantic Oceanographic & Meteorological Laboratory (AOML), where he ended up getting the ultimate intern experience — the chance to fly directly into a hurricane.

Hurricanes had always fascinated Trivedi — as a child, he spent summers with his grandparents in Fort Lauderdale, where they’d pore over hurricane data in the local newspaper. Hurricanes are his favorite atmospheric anomaly.

Trivedi (left) wears a wig, posing for a photo on his @DCAreaWx page with the caption: “Dressing as the @stormmode Madison local news legends for Halloween @jockosports @CharlieShortino.” Mike Jaques reposted, saying, “This may be the greatest moment of my career. #honored #grateful.”

Hurricane Sandy, which circulated D.C. in 2012, was one of the first events that sparked a meteorological interest for 9-year-old Trivedi. His house had a simple counter barometer, which is an instrument used to indicate air pressure. The lower the pressure, the higher the water would rise in the tube. Every hour, little Trivedi tracked the height of the water in the tube, which eventually overflowed.

“The air pressure got so low that I couldn’t do it anymore because the water just started spilling out,” Trivedi says. “Which was sick.”

By seventh grade, Trivedi started posting his observations about weather patterns on his Twitter account @DCAreaWx.

“I wanted to tell people about my stupid, uneducated opinions about [Hurricane Irma] and no one cared in person, so I just started tweeting it,” Trivedi laughs, “... to, also, no one.”

He continued to use the account over the years to track tropical storms and post his predictions, always with a disclaimer that they were his personal thoughts and that patterns could shift.

Eventually this is the account where Trivedi would share his excitement to be a part of the internship that would allow him to conduct real research in the field.

Trivedi’s always been interested in storm chasing. Right after he got his driver’s license in high school, he drove to Maryland to catch a big storm with tornadoes — his third-favorite atmospheric anomaly.

“He was new to storm chasing at this point,” his mother, Bhavini Trivedi, recalls. “The tornado changed directions and ended up chasing him! He had to drive like crazy to get out of its way. He ended up getting a speeding ticket recorded on one of those automatic cameras and mailed to us. I never wanted him to go again after that.”

She chuckles, “But he has not really listened to me.”

In Miami, Trivedi’s research revolved around the Hurricane Analysis and Forecast System (HAFS) — NOAA’s “next-generation, multi-scale numerical model” that uses satellite data and ocean interaction to analyze and forecast storms. He spent the internship hoping for the opportunity to go on the plane that flies into tropical storms and hurricanes to collect data.

“At that point, I didn’t realize, no one goes on the plane,” he says.

By “no one,” Trivedi means HRD interns. No science intern had flown in roughly 20 years, ceding priority to full-fledged NOAA scientists, National Hurricane Center forecasters and military pilots. Given that Trivedi’s internship was set to end just as peak hurricane season was beginning in late August, his chances to break that streak seemed unlikely.

Just before his departure, a tropical wave that began off the coast of Africa crossed the Atlantic Ocean and unexpectedly grew to become Hurricane Debby. In the 48 hours that followed, Trivedi managed to delay his return flight by three days, move out of his now-expired employer-provided housing, spend a night at his grandparents’ house in Fort Lauderdale and start attending Hurricane Hunter briefings — all while still unsure whether he’d ever actually get on the plane. Finally, he and one other HRD intern received the confirmatory message: “Your mission is a go.” Trivedi was on the plane when it took off at 4 a.m. on Aug. 4.

“When we were taking off, they let me sit up in the cockpit so I could see everything. They let me mess around with the speed of the plane,” Trivedi says. “And yeah, I was really scared.”

The hurricane was amazingly close to the launch site — only 30 minutes away. Trivedi returned to the back of the plane, taking his graciously sanctioned window seat in the scientists’ row. Over the six hours, Trivedi took photographs and readings.

But mostly, Trivedi spent the time “just doing what I do, which is look at every pass, except I don’t have to wait for it to update,” he says. “I also spent so much time looking out the window. I’ve never flown that low. You just see so much.”

The view of Debby from 5,000 feet above sea level was blob-like, initially. Trivedi says the appearance was “messy” because it was lopsided — all the storms were on the eastern side of the actual midpoint. The hurricane really started to intensify about halfway through the flight, when clusters of thunderstorms started wrapping around the center.

“On our very last pass, I actually got to see the semblance of the eye wall forming,” Trivedi says, smiling.

Later that day, about 17 hours after he woke up, Trivedi posted on his X account, which now has more than 6,600 followers.

That post from @DCAreaWx now has more than 36,000 views. And that curious kid from the D.C. area, who loved weather experiments and kept a list of his favorite atmospheric anomalies, can now call himself a hurricane hunter.