I’m not generally a big fan of National Geographic Channel shows. All too often, the hype overwhelms the storytelling. That being said, tonight’s program, Disaster Lab: Into the Tornado, has narration that is relatively restrained.
Some of that may be that tornados are pretty incredible storms. But I think what makes this work more than not is that the focus is on the science and the people doing it.
My biggest problems are with the missing parts. Scientist Tim Samaras has developed ground probes to determine what goes on in a tornado’s funnel and needs to get them in the path of a tornado at just the right time. Which sounds a lot like the plot of the 1996 film Twister. But the program never mentions the movie. Was it really that far ahead of its time?
The program explains that accurate wind measurements from inside the tornado have been impossible to get, unlike the measurements gotten for hurricanes by special planes flying over, but doesn’t say why planes can’t do the same for tornados.
Family-wise, it’s pretty safe, although small children might find it frightening because tornados are scary and you do see shots of cars being tossed and a house being lifted up and shattered. Repeatedly. Something for the more eagle-eyed among your kids, there’s a shot of something rolling over a field, ostensibly shot from a team member’s car that had been blown off the road into a ditch. Funny thing is, what looks an awful lot like the same shot appears later – seemingly from a different storm.
There is some good information here. And, of course, the job isn’t done. Samaras is going to have to get a lot more probes hit by tornado – which isn’t easy to do – before he can get enough data to develop a computer model. And your kids may want to get some more data on storm chasing and tornado studies before believing everything in this program. But that’s part of learning how to be media-savvy, right?
And if you guys come up with anything interesting, please feel free to comment.
Anne Louise Bannon
Your Family Viewer
