5/31/2013 Intercept and Escape from El Reno, OK Tornado 

In so many El Rino videos, the chaser will be looking at a 2 mile wall of cloud and say, "I can't see the tornado", then it turns out that wall of cloud is the tornado. Chilling stuff.

Without watching the rest of the video and knowing the title and at 4:25 "We are north east of it; this is perfect position" sent chills down my spine.

“It’s gotta be a mile wide” Tornado: “hahahahahahahah”

This thing spawned many powerful sub vortices all around its enormous radius like they’re nothing. The people that escaped from its path were EXTREMELY lucky. A churning wall cloud that basically touched the ground with endless tentacles. What a Monster.

The last 4 min of this is the best tornado footage I've ever seen. I slowed it down and went frame by frame and there's just so much to look at. This was so big and violent that the satellite tornadoes were half mile to mile wide wedges... It's just incredible footage!!!

I’ve watched so many El Reno tornado videos and only now have I stumbled upon this footage. The last 4 mins of the video is some of the best I’ve seen, no doubt. At moments, the monster seemed stationary, and then seconds later, it’s like it decided to take off at ridiculous speed and try to kill you. Your instincts, and a little bit of luck, definitely saved you that day. 👍🏼

The vortex that appears at 17:29 was recorded on radar moving at almost 200mph. Not windspeed, ground movement speed.

At least these guys kept the camera on the tornadoe 90% of the time and kept up with the storm at a safe distance and still continued to film the storm successfully. Great job guys

Somebody else said it but I saw it too. From 16:40 until 17:10 you can easily see that there were two wedges rotating around each other each with it's own multiple vortices the size of med sized stovepipe drills with smaller vortices rotating around the two. That is crazy! I remember watching a little earlier than that where you only see the one that it looked kind of strange off to the right of the main wedge. It looked like the entire rotation was way too big and oblong to be just the rotation around the visible wedge and then just as soon as they started to move you realize what was really going on. The whole thing was so big that there was the main wedge with a satellite wedged forming on it's Northern edge. You just couldn't see it because the overall rotation was so big you figured it was because of the main wedge. But what was really happening was the whole overall rotation was the tornado and the wedges were the vortices. I think there were three wedge vortices trading strength as they'd rotate around each other, rising on Western side and dropping down as the came around to the Eastern side of the main rotation. Mind you, each wedge had its own vortices. Insanity!

"Never going on another dirt road again", said no storm chaser ever.

That thing was in a class of its own... My jaw was literally on the ground watching that. One of the best videos of that thing... The whole damn cloud wall was churning... I gotta watch that again.

This weather event surprised the heck out of very experienced storm chasers. One could say unprecedented. It's remarkable that folks were able to continue capturing valuable footage while running for their lives. On a different note language goes along with the territory when your scared like hell. I wouldn't be reading religious passages myself. Thanks for sharing.

By far, the best view of the El Reno tornado that I have seen from countless videos!!

That's no moon. It's a space station.

Single. Best. El Reno. Footage. Out there. Amazing work you guys. Epic!

Holy crap. This is the best El Reno footage. Id put it up with the top 10 tornado footages ever taken. Spectacular.

13:03 Theres a reason why this is one of the most replayed parts of the video. The time is 6:20 PM. Just to the right of the sub vortex, you can clearly see headlights right next to it. And on the left, Dim headlights. Who's headlights are they? Dan Robinson and the Twistex Team racing east on Reuter road. What you are seeing is from I40 looking down near Alfadale and Reuter road, seeing the headlights of the Twistex Team in their final moments. At around 16:50, you can see what looks to be headlights spinning around the wedge, and then being spat out to the right. Some say those were the TWISTEX headlights being tossed out of the tornado

Holy hell. Thank god you guys are alive. This is the best tornado footage I have ever seen, and it’s of the absolute phenomenon that is the El Reno monster. I’ve never seen anything like it.

So thankful for videos like these that captured the intensity of this particular strong tornado (and survived).

Jim: "do you see this jessie?" Jessie: "oh i see it jim" lmfao

Some other people in the comments have pointed this out, but at 16:54 you see what appears to be headlights spinning inside the tornado, and then eject from it on the right. That may have been Twistex's vehicle.

You do know that most tornadoes travel from southwest to northeast, right? Unless by saying "we're in perfect position here" you mean, "We're in the path of the tornado. You got lucky that this particular tornado turned south. That's rare.

that is not a tornado that is a small scale hurricane

some of the BEST footage besides Pecos Hank's footage of the storm. THX BOYS!!

14:05-17:40. Some of the best tornado footage ever

I like when Jeff says, "There is a tornado in the ground, right there!" and, I heard the wheel's on your vehicle squeal as the driver hit the brakes, and locked her up! Great footage, some of the best of the day!

by far the best footage ive ever seen of the el reno 2013 tornado hands down

You guys were WAY too close! Although amazing freaking footage. Picturing twistex's car in my mind. . The way this tornado moved, it felt like it was chasing you guys'. Especially at 17:27 when it threw out that 175mph sub vort at you, like it was reaching. This was a scary SCARY tornado.

That EF-5 was a monster, my God it's a miracle more storm chasers weren't killed.

I remember being in NW OKC that day, looking west. Looking west, all one saw was *tornado* . The next day was my 59th birthday, and I remember actively praying that I would live to see the day. We didn't get the tornado (fortunately). That was one of the absolute WORST supercell thunderstorms I ever experienced in my entire life, and it went on for HOURS.

That thing had a sub-vortice the size of a wedge at 17:32!

13:17 is the final moments team Twistex was filmed before being killed by that large vortex you can see the car’s headlights get picked up by the tornado.

Amazing footage. I grew up in Nebraska tornados are pretty scary the way they switch directions is crazy and unpredictable you guys are pretty brave.

16:54, the scariest part about this time stamp is that if you look at the right you can see a satellite tornado passing over where they just were

Never fails to blow my mind. Like an evil carousel, or Medusa with the head in the middle and tons of flailing snakes around it. The irony is how slow it looks like it’s moving, but those sub-vortices measure at nearly 300 mph.

Well played guys! What a team to do this! I look forward to your future vids on severe storms!

dude has balls to escape the tornado in its path and drive right next to that monsters inflow jet

Nice job guys like the clear view you got of the tornado in the last couple minutes of video.

One of the best videos of this tornado

I think i have seen most of the el reno footage, and this was the best imo

Amazing close coverage of a tornado's progress thru El Reno when it seems like the other vantage points had too much rain to get that close. It was moving Northeast for much of the video, right? Anyway, such great photography these researchers got!

These guys had the same moment that it seems like every video has where the storm chaser realizes they're in trouble and have gotten too close

I love the unedited footage. high tension. !!!!

14:40 "OK no more f-bombs"..... After the 60th one they finally had enough lmao :D In all seriousness though I think this is the best footage of the El Reno tornado I have seen yet.

I didn't know Bill & Ted did storm chases.

Jesus at the end you can really see the massive scale with the multiple vortices. The one at the far right of the screen at 16:54 shows how insane it truely is as well as how close it actually was. Most footage is hard to tell that it has that big because it's so wet.

This is like the entire supercell is an iceberg and it is slamming tip-first into planet earth. I was thinking about a tornado as a thin funnel that connects clouds parallel to the ground to each other for a bit. But I see now the entire cloud is a violent rotating monster.

I wonder if this is a fair representation of what the 2007 Greensburg, Kansas tornado would have looked like had it not occurred at night? While not quite as wide as this one, that tornado did approach 2 miles in width and was a similar caliber to this one.

Amazing footage!

Absolutely incredible, saw a satellite twice, this was not a supercell this was what I call a hypercell

@15:30 it is so beautiful. It reminds you of that Greensburg KS F-5. So totally does.

I am floored at how this was technically an invisible tornado. Were there any indicators or instruments that were able to pick up the exterior 2.6 mile wide tornadic bands?

The best video that i´ve seen!

It looks like Twistex tried to stop and turn around at the last second.

I see why this one was called a meso on the ground, good grief. How do you even define its boundaries?

My father was tracking this with software on his laptop and The Weather Channel. They thought it was going to hit Moore. I remember saying, "No! Not Moore, again!" Of course you don't want it to hit any populated area but not the same only about a week apart.

Those suction vortices at the end made this footage. Incredible job!

This was an awesome ride!!! Brave guys, totally awesome shots!!!

Great footage!!!

Wow. At the start of the video, you guys are on proper distance and that wind is picking up fast. I can only imagine the destruction and it's speed close to it. Stay safe people. Edit: You guys were actually very close. Amazing video and please stay safe

Out of all the tornado videos I've watched over the years, I've never seen a tornado do what this one did before

From their original vantage point at 4:25 when he mentioned being northeast of it, they likely wouldn't have had any issues staying there even with it changing direction and increasing in size later on, as it would have been several miles to their east at that point. As I understand, a lot of the chasers that approached from the north were trying to get closer as it was moving *away* from them initially and they got surprised when it switched to moving NE from SE.

The most photogenic shots I’ve seen, rain wrapped vast mass of a 2.5 mile tornado, on the right side.. greats shots.. glad y’all are ok. R.I.P. TIM, PAUL,CARL.. ✝

Yes, best footage of it, and maybe top 10 best tornado footage ever dare i say? From 13:02- 17:42 at least. So, beautiful. So, transfixing. Gorgeous tornsdo

Wow! You could really see how large this beast was! No wonder why it was 2.6 miles wide. This video says it all.

A the 16:43 mark, reminds me of the Sandstorm sequence in Mad Max Fury Road, but with a lot less sand...

Seeing so many videos, Nat GEO's docu, and other accounts, it just amazes me that this vortex didn't hit a heavy residential area. It would have been the worst tornado incident on record if so. Great content!

Amazing thing about that monster is that it didn't hit much. Staying on the North side of it was fortuitous.

Wow that was wild. Thanks for the footage.

Amazing like everyone said best EL Reno footage I’ve seen yet and I watch a lot good job guys you were very professional I appreciate it so much thank you for risking your life so I can see this thank you

Satellites popping to the right and then what you think is a main condensation cone near the end is actually a monster satellite cone around the main circulation

Great job guys😉

from 16. 52 to 16.59 car headlights are seen going from left side of funnel to right side of screen - about one third up the funnel - you have to be in full screen to see it - i have also picked this out in another el reno video.

So around 17:30 they’re heading east on I40 correct? Is that not the giant sub vortex that hit Twistex?

after reviewing this vid, Jeff's vid, Dan's vid and Skip's GPS vid, and using google earth street view on Jensen and I-40 to replicate the view from 13:02 to 13:25, the vehicle lights we see are located on Jensen. The power poles are on Jensen, the tree groves are on Jensen, and the buildings are on Jensen. The distance to Reuter is just too great, and the line of sight just doesnt work. The view from I-40 pretty much shows that is just not possible. Going by Skip's gps map and Jeff's vid, I think a pair of the lights are actually Jeff's on Jensen..At least 4 chasers were on Jensen at the time these chasers were on this spot on I-40..

Were you guys on highway 81? because when it was around that area, it was at it's peak width.

I had a really hard time comprehending the size of this tornado, until now🙁😐

I found a video of someone running away from it. I think it was rear dash cam. You could see it expanding towards him whilst he was driving fast away from it. Can't find the video since

question.what if it would have changed direction?

I'm not a storm chaser by any means just trying to learn about tornado formation and genesis but can anyone tell me what kind of "cape" this storm had? Just curious

At 16:55 you can see the satellite tornado on the right side of the screen.

CAN ANYONE TELL ME WHAT TIMESTAMP IS THE PART WHERE THE TORNADO IS THE BIGGEST?

Great video

crazy stuff ty for the vid

Great footage

13:16-13:23 dam we can clearly see Samaras and Robinsons headlights what a great view

He said its up in there somewhere I'm no expert but brother its everywhere and all around you

I don't know if anyone will see this comment but I am really curious if anyone knows - there seems to be an insane, sudden increase in wind from 17:40 to 17:50. Is this inflow straightline wind to the storm? Or is it a subvortex that suddenly was on top of them out of nowhere? Something else? If anyone knows or has any thoughts I would love to know.

It's your tornado, Jesse. Jesse: I DON'T WANT IT!!!!

This tornado is why you do not get close to violent tornado. One satellite tornado, possibly the one at the end of the video that gets flung out was travelling at 177MPH. This No matter ho many safe routes you have planned, an abrupt change of direction, speed and size can make what looked like a previously good decision now life threatening.

11:30 Yup if you're asking that whole thing is the tornado.

Move that storm just a bit south and it goes right into Moore. And Moore probably ceases too exist

May 31 2013 the day the rules changed! a video can't do this incredible monster justice! this is one storm I will never forget! it didn't just brake the record it destroyed it!

Good Lord! Look at the size of that thing!

My wife and I seen that monster when we were driving down the highway. We turned around and stopped and watched it.

amazing footage,,great job!

At the 13:24 mark, the second set of headlights on a parallel road to this footage has to be the Twistex crew before a vortice reached out and grabbed them😢

Yeah thats some of the best footage ive seen other than @pecos hank's . I could tell there at the end yall got a Lil closer than you wanted to.

Where did you set up at

These guys are legit insane!