Twists of Fate: How Hollywood Inspires Generations of Meteorologists
A ticket from a 1996 screening of the movie, “Twister,” superimposed over a tornado blowing through a large field. Photo: NOAA Heritage
Tornadoes are as much a part of hurricane season as hurricanes. The cruel 1-2 punch of post-storm twister spin-offs is something most of us would like to not think about. While the topography is very different, tornado reality is something that the coast shares with our Tornado Alley neighbors. Speaking of twister spin-offs, the current Hollywood hit, ‘Twisters’ involved NOAA tornado experts behind the scenes to to make the science as accurate and realistic as possible. NOAA logos, props and staffers as unpaid extras are visible throughout. This story – about how films like these stoke interest in weather science – is but one part of an excellent collection of tornado stories on the agency’s site. – Editor
This summer, a new blockbuster features severe weather as the ultimate super-villain. Tornadoes and tornado researchers play huge roles in the script of the new movie, Twisters, with a young woman facing both her fear of storms and her fear of miscalculating data as she follows dangerous cloud formations alongside a brash and handsome celebrity storm chaser.
The movie, released by Universal Studios on July 19, 2024, is a kind of homage to the 1996 movie, Twister. The original also mixed science, romance, and bad weather with a plot focused on two storm-chasing researchers on the brink of divorce who are forced to work together to collect novel data inside a tornado.
The 1996 movie has become a classic and is sometimes credited for increasing enrollment at some meteorology schools such as the one at the University of Oklahoma.
Keli Pirtle, a public affairs officer supporting NOAA’s tornado experts says that the first Twister movie influenced a lot of people’s careers. Nationally, bachelors degrees in meteorology increased by 47% from 1994 to 2004 and more than doubled by 2007. (Years later, critics even expressed concern that there weren’t enough jobs for all the fresh graduates.) offsite link
Some speculate that the new movie may eventually have the same impact as the 1996 movie.
Pirtle, who grew up in Norman, Oklahoma, was early in her own communications career when the first movie arrived in the mid-1990s. A few years later she would transition into the job supporting NOAA in Norman, including the National Severe Storms Laboratory and the Storm Prediction Center, helping communicate about the science there ever since.
