Storm Chaser Jeff Smith

10/11/2026

Another view of our Hurricane Isaias data. This one is from my iPhone.

This graph shows every recorded phone pressure reading during the 1 hour landfall window with no smoothing. My lowest reading was 986.192 mb at 8:19:24 PM CDT.

We’re collecting iPhone barometer data alongside our calibrated Isopod and Isopod VDU instruments to evaluate whether phones can serve as useful supplementary pressure sensors.

Early comparisons show encouraging agreement in pressure trends, with persistent offsets between the phones and their companion instruments. Further testing will help establish their accuracy and practical limits.

10/11/2026

TN Storm Hunters is now Storm Chaser Zach on Facebook and WXwithZach on the other socials

Be sure to give fellow Recon Weather field team member Zach Fortner a like and follow

10/11/2026

10/11/2026

🌪️ TORNADO WATCH: North Carolina. Small red polygons are tornado warnings as of 12:12pm EDT. Prepare to seek shelter.

10/11/2026

The pre-hurricane in the Florida Panhandle the other night was really something. Great reminder that the whole storm chasing thing is really about 10% storms, 90% everything else. There's so many ways to branch off from the tornado agenda. The moment that the sky lit up like this gathered more views, attention and outreach than the actual hurricane coverage.

The other thing that really resonated with people was interacting with our atmospheric research mission, live, in the weather app that I built. Years ago I would have never guessed that in 2026 I would have launched all this. A great team makes things possible, yes, but for years I thought I was stuck hating my life until it ended.

I'm excited to see how far we can take this into 2027. We raised $28,000+ in 2026, thanks to the audience who really does come thru on these things every time, and we're hoping, with your support, to pull that off again.

The planned budget is live, transparent, and online on the website. Go see what we plan to spend the funds on and learn a little about the mission and app. You clicking the 'share' button on posts like this are worth as much as money, plus it's free.

10/11/2026

Nearly 70 mph while parked in Fort Walton Beach during the hurricane.

Our Calypso ultrasonic wind instrument recorded that peak gust during Hurricane Isaias, while an Extreme Wind Warning and Flash Flood Emergency were in effect. Also notable: the parking lot was flash flooding faster than anything I'd ever seen.

We’re still reviewing the full dataset our team collected, but this is an early look at the observations we brought home.

We’re building vehicle-mounted instruments using these ultrasonic anemometers for the 2027 season. They’ll help our field team collect wind measurements to support Recon Weather’s atmospheric research.

A big thank-you to Kaymont and Scientific Sales for helping us obtain these instruments and supporting the work. They supply the United States Government with weather balloons and are huge supporters of the crowd-funded research mission that I'm working with. I think it's really cool to have the support of industry leaders like this.

10/11/2026

⚠️ Flash Flood Warning for areas just northwest of Yuma, Arizona. Another up to 2 inches of rain will likely continue the flash flooding threat for several hours

10/11/2026

Don't see this every day. Tropical Storm Watch for Southern California! Previous-Tropical Storm Rachel is moving in. Lots of you may remember the impactful flooding that Hillary brought back in 2023. I don't think this is anything like that, but be prepared for flash flooding threat to linger a while longer.

10/10/2026