Storm chaser Reed Timmer has spent decades trying to get closer to tornadoes than almost anyone else. Now, a new documentary puts moviegoers right there with him.
“Never Stop Chasing,” directed by Timmer's longtime collaborator Ken Cole, plays in North Texas through Thursday. The film follows Timmer across two decades of storm chasing, combining the science and spectacle of tornadoes with a more personal look at the losses and risks that have shaped his career.
Timmer told NTX Now that watching the film in a theater gave even him a new perspective on what it feels like to chase a tornado.
“It almost felt more like being in the Dominator inside of a tornado than when I drive the Dominator into a tornado,” Timmer said. “So it gives you that backseat experience in the backseat of our armored vehicle that we use to get inside of tornadoes.”
Bringing the tornado into the theater
The filmmakers designed “Never Stop Chasing” as an immersive theater experience. Cole and his team used a 22-camera setup to capture 360-degree footage as Timmer and Team Dominator pursued severe storms.
The film was shot in Dolby Vision, while its Dolby Atmos sound mix was completed at StudioPost at Universal Studios. The sound was built around the actual physics of what tornadoes sound like at close range, including low frequencies standard field microphones often don't capture.
Timmer says the result gives moviegoers “a front row seat” to his team's work.
And when Timmer says they drive into tornadoes, he means it.
“We're inside of the core flow of the tornado, so our goal is to get in the middle of the tornado,” he said.
The armored Dominator 3 is designed to lower its exterior shell to the ground and use spikes to anchor the vehicle in place. From inside, Timmer's team launches rockets carrying sensors into tornadoes to collect data.
“The whole entire goal of the Dominator is to measure the surface winds inside of a tornado, because it's a big mystery of tornado science as to how strong the wind speeds can get at ground level,” Timmer said.
The loss behind the chase
The documentary also examines the human cost of Timmer's work.
It revisits the 2013 El Reno tornado in Oklahoma, which killed veteran storm researcher Tim Samaras, his son Paul Samaras and Carl Young. Timmer visits their memorial in the film.
“Tim Samaras was a great friend and a mentor of mine in tornado science, and he was a pioneer in our field as well,” Timmer said.
Seeing that chapter of his life on screen brought back difficult memories.
“It was a very emotional experience watching that scene in the movie,” he explained. “It kind of brings all that loss back as well.”
From fear to fascination
Timmer’s mother confesses her son always turned "fear into fascination," a theme throughout his life that she might have played a part in as a middle school science teacher who encouraged his interest in science. But as a child, Timmer says, “I was actually scared to death of thunder and lightning when I was about 5 or 6 years old and then just became obsessed with tornadoes and storm chasing from then on out.”
That fascination eventually became both a career and a scientific mission, one “Never Stop Chasing” attempts to recreate for audiences from the safety of a theater seat.
The 102-minute documentary runs through Thursday at AMC Stonebriar 24 in Frisco, AMC Grapevine Mills 24 in Grapevine and AMC Mesquite 30 in Mesquite.
Miranda Suarez and Ron Corning are the hosts of KERA's NTX Now. Got a tip? Email Miranda at msuarez@kera.org or Ron at rcorning@kera.org.
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