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posted by mrpg on Monday April 01 2019, @07:39AM   Printer-friendly
from the storm dept.

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956

[...] Kelley Gene Williamson and Randall Yarnall were heading north, directly towards the storm. At the time, on 28 March 2017, they were covering the event for the Weather Channel programme Storm Wranglers. [...] Yarnall was driving his Chevrolet truck at about 70mph (113km/h) at the time, according to a lawsuit filed on Tuesday. A video the friends were live-streaming for the Weather Channel's Facebook page showed they made no attempt to stop at the junction.

The footage cut out a split second before a Jeep driven by Corbin Jaeger drove westbound into the junction. Jaeger, who had the right of way, was driving away from the storm.

Williamson, Yarnall and Jaeger - a respected storm chaser working for the National Weather Service - were all killed on the spot.

The lawsuit, filed by Jaeger's mother, seeks up to $125m (£95m) in damages. It puts the blame firmly at the door of Williamson and Yarnall, whom it calls "habitually reckless and dangerous", as well as the Weather Channel.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47720417


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  • (Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Monday April 01 2019, @02:34PM

    by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us (6553) on Monday April 01 2019, @02:34PM (#823084) Journal

    Easy enough to parse to get the gist: The driver was not driving with full attention to road conditions nor with respect to lawful speeds and caused a fatal accident. The other driver, while having the right of way, was not perceptive enough to realize that anytime there is a storm there will be persons driving without full attention to road conditions. (People blow stop signs and cause accidents even in perfectly clear weather).

    Even in "perfect" conditions storm chasers get killed. Trained spotters (which I'm sure they were as well) learn this, but actually getting a lesson in the eternal vigilance needed is costly. People will still chase storms for various reasons.

    The real lesson is to do our best to learn from their errors and continue the mission of providing actually necessary ground intelligence (the reasons spotters still are needed by NWS) in the least risky manner possible.

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