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CNN Live Today

Killer Tornadoes

Aired May 05, 2003 - 11:36   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CHAD MYERS, CNN ANCHOR: Got a meteorologist on the line from Kansas City. I have chased tornadoes in trucks, pickups, live trucks, satellite trucks.
But, Don, you chased a tornado yesterday in a helicopter.

Good morning.

Describe your experience.

DON HARMAN, METEOROLOGIST: Chad, good morning to you as well.

And after that chase, we are reviewing our insurance policy, and our medical policies of course here at Fox.

It started off 3:00, 3:30 in the afternoon. We took off from the down town airport in Kansas City, west westward to Lawrence, Kansas, as a staging area. We watched some of this activity develop. You hear reports of tornadoes on the ground. You hear reports of damaging tornadoes on the ground.

But once you see it, whether it be from an automobile, or a truck or just stationary spotter on the ground, once you see it, your chase perspective kind of scales back into more of a -- we have a tornado on the ground. This is doing damage. Then Sky Fox pilot and I saw the damage probably 10 minutes later in some cases, and it was a very humbling experience to know that we weren't talking about a possible tornado, but we had a tornado that was on the ground.

And just 10 minutes ago had some damage. There's some damage video in there in places. And at that...

MYERS: We're seeing it.

HARMAN: At that point, I called back to the weather office, you know, through master control, trying to stay as calm as possible, telling Mike, Joe and Tina, saying listen, you know, we need to make sure people realize this has done damage, houses are destroyed, and this may continue for an hour or hour and a half as it moved not 10 miles from downtown Kansas City.

MYERS: Clearly your eyewitness account there probably saved some lives. I'm sure it did, because you were probably in front of the weather service on the warnings, were you not?

HARMAN: Not necessarily. What we were trying to do -- and it's a group effort, Chad, as I'm sure you know, between the weather service, the spotters and media to confirm or deny what they think is going on. And it's video like this, I think, that then is not so much a television, hey, look what we're doing, but more of a, hey, this is real, you need to take cover.

I think it says something about all the media outlets, the National Weather Service out of Pleasant Hill that we only had one fatality out of what could have been a terrible situation with I'd say easily F-3 if not borderline F-4 damage.

MYERS: Sure does look like with all those trees losing limbs and everything, yes, sure does look like at least 200 miles per hour, meteorologist Don Harman.

Fabulous perspective, great reporting yesterday. Thank you very much for joining us here at CNN.

HARMAN: Good to be with you, Chad.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired May 5, 2003 - 11:36   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CHAD MYERS, CNN ANCHOR: Got a meteorologist on the line from Kansas City. I have chased tornadoes in trucks, pickups, live trucks, satellite trucks.
But, Don, you chased a tornado yesterday in a helicopter.

Good morning.

Describe your experience.

DON HARMAN, METEOROLOGIST: Chad, good morning to you as well.

And after that chase, we are reviewing our insurance policy, and our medical policies of course here at Fox.

It started off 3:00, 3:30 in the afternoon. We took off from the down town airport in Kansas City, west westward to Lawrence, Kansas, as a staging area. We watched some of this activity develop. You hear reports of tornadoes on the ground. You hear reports of damaging tornadoes on the ground.

But once you see it, whether it be from an automobile, or a truck or just stationary spotter on the ground, once you see it, your chase perspective kind of scales back into more of a -- we have a tornado on the ground. This is doing damage. Then Sky Fox pilot and I saw the damage probably 10 minutes later in some cases, and it was a very humbling experience to know that we weren't talking about a possible tornado, but we had a tornado that was on the ground.

And just 10 minutes ago had some damage. There's some damage video in there in places. And at that...

MYERS: We're seeing it.

HARMAN: At that point, I called back to the weather office, you know, through master control, trying to stay as calm as possible, telling Mike, Joe and Tina, saying listen, you know, we need to make sure people realize this has done damage, houses are destroyed, and this may continue for an hour or hour and a half as it moved not 10 miles from downtown Kansas City.

MYERS: Clearly your eyewitness account there probably saved some lives. I'm sure it did, because you were probably in front of the weather service on the warnings, were you not?

HARMAN: Not necessarily. What we were trying to do -- and it's a group effort, Chad, as I'm sure you know, between the weather service, the spotters and media to confirm or deny what they think is going on. And it's video like this, I think, that then is not so much a television, hey, look what we're doing, but more of a, hey, this is real, you need to take cover.

I think it says something about all the media outlets, the National Weather Service out of Pleasant Hill that we only had one fatality out of what could have been a terrible situation with I'd say easily F-3 if not borderline F-4 damage.

MYERS: Sure does look like with all those trees losing limbs and everything, yes, sure does look like at least 200 miles per hour, meteorologist Don Harman.

Fabulous perspective, great reporting yesterday. Thank you very much for joining us here at CNN.

HARMAN: Good to be with you, Chad.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com