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Ryan Reynolds (6:29)

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Ryan Reynolds (6:59)

Why choose a Sleep number Smart bed.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (7:01)

Can I make my site softer?

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Paige Desorbo (7:29)

Hey, let me let you in on a little secret. I've turned staying into bed into an art form. It's just my place. It's my shopping sanctuary and honestly the perfect place to hang out with all of my favorite people. So join me and some of the most interesting people I know for shopping, some laughs, and maybe a few secrets. All from the comfort of my bed. And the best part, you can watch from your bed. All new episodes of my show in bed with Paige Desorbo air Mondays at 8pm Eastern Standard Time on Amazon Live. Just open prime video on your TV and search Amazon Live to cozy up in bed with me, Paige desorbo Because why get out of bed if you don't have to.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (8:14)

Storms are some of nature's most powerful and awe inspiring forces, capable of shaping landscapes and affecting millions of lives. Storm chasers pursue these extreme weather events up close, risking life and limb to better understand tornadoes, hurricanes and severe storms. Dr. Reed Timmer has intercepted and studied some of the planet's most extreme storms, contributing not only breathtaking footage but also valuable scientific data to tornado and hurricane research. With a PhD in meteorology from the University of Oklahoma, Dr. Timmer's work bridges adventurous field science and rigorous research, advancing our understanding of storm dynamics, improving forecasting models and supporting public safety through life saving reports and educational outreach. So let's chat with extreme meteorologist and storm chaser Dr. Reid Timmer. He's featured in Discovery Channel's series in the Eye of the Storm. Reid, thank you for joining us.

Dr. Reid Timmer (9:09)

Thank you for having me.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (9:11)

So thrilled to chat with you. I mean, you've intercepted over a thousand tornadoes, is that right?

Dr. Reid Timmer (9:17)

Yeah, I've definitely lost count. I've been doing it for almost 30 years now, ever since I got my driver's license. And I know that it's over a thousand, but it's really all I've ever done is storm chase and study meteorology.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (9:29)

Yeah. So over a thousand. You've driven directly into a lot of storms in your Dominator vehicles. I got to ask, what keeps you motivated to chase storms today?

Dr. Reid Timmer (9:39)

Well, I've been obsessed with the sciences since as far as I can remember, since five or six years old. And my mom was a seventh grade middle school science teacher and she really got me into the sciences from day one. And I collected insects for 15 years. I was into tree identification, reptiles and amphibians and was big into the life sciences. But my deep rooted passion was always for meteorology and storm chasing. And when I got my driver's license in 1996, that changed everything because I didn't have to wait for the storms to come to me anymore, but I could get in my car and drive after them and then move to Oklahoma in 97 and have been studying meteorology ever since. And following my life passion, which is to chase storms and study the thermodynamics of tornadoes. And just having a blast, non stop chasing storms, that's amazing.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (10:28)

You created these specially designed armored vehicles called dominators. How do your dominator vehicles and new sensor technologies help you collect the data that really no one else can during these extreme weather events?

Dr. Reid Timmer (10:41)

Yeah, we have armored storm chasing vehicles that were custom built to survive a tornado and they're outfitted with instruments. We shoot rockets into the tornadoes that have miniaturized sensors in the nose cone. And the whole goal is to measure the ground up data set inside of a tornado that includes wind speed, the thermodynamics inside. And we intercept the tornado with our tank like vehicles. And they have an outer shell that's debris resistant, but it's shaped such that it'll always have a downward force directed on the vehicle. And we also have spikes that drill into the ground that keep us anchored down. And we've got a couple of rockets inside of tornadoes. But the goal with the dominators is to get right inside the circulation to measure the winds right near the ground, because those are the ones that impact people's lives. In northern Alabama, we intercepted a tornado and I didn't put the spikes down because I thought it was going just a little bit further east. And it shot out a suction vortex, basically a sub vortex of the tornado. And it hit the dominator and spun it in a circle for a second. We measured nearly 200 mile per hour winds, but it was such a small compact vortex that it just hit the front of the vehicle, spun it, and then moved off to the east. And we launched a sensor into it. It rose right up through the suction vortex and then we never found it. So we're still trying to find that parachute probe somewhere north of huntsville, Alabama.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (11:59)

Oh, that's so. Because you eject it, so then it can get captured and then you have to go and look for it after.

Dr. Reid Timmer (12:05)

Yeah, but it can live stream data through long range radio, but we only get the one time per second data when that happens. So we have to recover the actual probe to get the full data set 10 times per second. And we do have some airtag technology in it, but then you need cell phone that comes within 300ft of it. And we think it's somewhere in the wilderness north of Huntsville. But the holy grail of data sets for tornadoes is on that sensor. So hopefully we can find it.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (12:32)

I hope so. Too. I'll cross my fingers. If we were driving by a dominator on the road, would we be able to recognize it? Do they have a distinct look to them for people who haven't seen.

Dr. Reid Timmer (12:43)

Yeah, they have a very unique look. It almost looks like a street sweeper or the Batmobile. I think people see it and recognize it, especially out in Tornado alley and in the Great Plains. And when they see it, a lot of times they think that severe weather is imminent. They get a little bit worried, but a lot of people get excited, too. They come up and see the vehicle. And during our speaking tour, the next generation of storm chasers, they're all making model dominators out of Legos. They're 3D printing, they're writing code. They're basically already engineers, and they're already teaching themselves how to storm chase. So I think probably in five or 10 years, there's just going to be a wave of tornado interceptors hitting the roads, doing science, which is great.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (13:24)

That's amazing that you've inspired so many people and that you have this great vehicle that's symbolic of the work that you do. That's pretty cool.

Dr. Reid Timmer (13:31)

Yeah. Initially, storm chasing was largely for nerds like myself when I first started it. And it's kind of interesting over the last 20 years that so many people want to do it.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (13:43)

I did want to bring up Hurricane Melissa, which was October 2025. We saw it rapidly intensify into a powerful Category 5 storm before it made landfall in Jamaica. It caused catastrophic flooding with winds over 180mph. From your perspective, what stood out to you most about Melissa's behavior and impact?

Dr. Reid Timmer (14:05)

Well, I thought it was interesting how it was drifting off to the west for a while with no steering flow at all. And I think we saw beta drift that was happening as it was pulling Earth's vorticity from higher latitude south on the west side. And it did that wobbling motion, and then suddenly it stopped in the middle of the night once the southwesterly steering started to feel that southern edge of the trough. And I thought it was fascinating how it just put on the brakes. But a hurricane that is moving at three to five miles an hour, you know, a lot of times we'll do those step function shifts in path, you know, as opposed to a hurricane that has some inertia and is moving along with some steering. So that sharp turnoff to the northeast I thought was fascinating and how the forecast models handled it. I was hoping that it would beta drift its way to the west of Jamaica, but unfortunately, that didn't happen. And it ended up hitting the west side of the island. The minimum pressure down to 892 millibars. And that complex terrain up there with the mountains greater than 3,000ft. Just as it was making landfall, I noticed that it wobbled off to the west as you had a little funneling of the easterlies to the south of the terrain. So watching it interact with the topography was also fascinating. But definitely your heart goes out to the people of Jamaica. They have a long road of recovery ahead. We have a lot of partners that are down there delivering supplies down to Jamaica. But I also wish I was down there to chase it.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (15:26)

Were there any unique challenges to Hurricane Melissa for data collection and forecasting?

Dr. Reid Timmer (15:32)

Yeah, the hurricane hunters that intercepted that hurricane, they encountered a bunch of turbulence and had to loiter in the eye. And they measured the strongest wind by Dropsonde, which was amazing with that record. But I was a little worried for the hurricane hunters because they had to loiter in the eye due to some unusual turbulence that they felt. But I've chased like 50 or 60 hurricanes, including Category 5 Hurricane Michael, and I lost my car, the Dominator 4, to the storm surge of Hurricane Ian down in Pine island, which was about 10 to 15ft deep. So when you're chasing a hurricane and you're trying to get the strongest winds possible, you need to target the right eye wall where it makes a 90 degree angle to the coastline, and then you can experience the winds off the relatively frictionless water. But a challenge with that is that you get a tsunami like storm surge that comes in from the piling up of the winds. So a lot of times you'll lose your vehicle or worse. But you have to find a stilt home basically to get above the flood to cover the hurricane from that perspective. But there's a lot of different challenges with chasing hurricanes versus tornadoes. It's less of a chase because it's such a slow moving, large mesoscale system. You just go to the location and get hit by it and see horizontal rain and try to deploy storm surge sensors. But tornadoes are much more of a chase. You're driving after them, reading the storm, trying to see where the tornadoes are going to happen. And that's what our science mission is focused on. And especially the multiple vortex tornadoes that have the potential of ramping the winds maybe even up to the speed of sound. In some of the strongest tornadoes.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (17:06)

How do you draw the line of how close to get into the path?

Dr. Reid Timmer (17:10)

Well, there's a big difference between a hurricane And a tornado, fundamentally, tornado is from a supercell storm. They happen in the mid latitudes and thrive off of wind shear, the jet stream. And then hurricanes are a larger sprawling system in the barotropic. So it's very different storm to chase, certainly, but we're trying to get inside both of those. But I would say it's a little less life threatening to get inside of a Category 5 hurricane, because it's a broader system. At least if you know what you're doing, if you're there and you get hit by it, there's other challenges like floods, flash floods, storm surge, you know, debris that can fly through the air. But a tornado is a stronger vortex. It's just more compact. And so the wind is constantly accelerating. You have vertical winds, extreme updrafts, constantly turning winds. And the acceleration of the wind is definitely something that you have to deal with with the Dominator because you just can't simulate that in a laboratory. But we're definitely trying to get inside both of those storms. But our science mission is focused on getting inside of a tornado because that's happened a lot less over history. There's very few data points measured inside of a tornado at ground level with actual instruments. And so that's what we're trying to do is uncover the relationship between the winds just above the ground in a tornado and the winds at the surface. And that's why we need the Dominator to survive those winds and measure them.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (18:32)

Have you had any close calls when it comes to doing this really dangerous work? Important scientifically, but it has risks. So how do you kind of change your approach when it comes to these close calls and prioritizing safety while trying to collect the data?

Dr. Reid Timmer (18:49)

Well, we have a lot of trust in the design of the Dominators. The Dominators can handle up to winds of like 175 miles an hour. But we want to make a Dominator 5 that's shaped more like a flying saucer, so it's less vulnerable to a side wind. And if it can survive an EF5, then I think it would take some of the anxiety out of the tornado intercept process. But I've had quite a few close calls. When we spun around in a circle in the Dominator, and I thought we were weightless for a split second and maybe airborne. And then the next split second, the tornado moved off to the northeast and there were a bunch of corn stalks in the car and we were facing to the north instead of to the east. So it was such a quick, compact vortex that it didn't have enough time to throw the dominator. And I think that the dominator even dissipated the suction vortex because you could see a damage path cutting right through the corn doing a left hand turn and then it hit the dominator and the damage path didn't continue on the other side of the road. So it was almost as if the barrier that the dominator was relative to the scale of the suction vortex may have even dissipated it.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (19:51)

Is there a way to witness these powerful events safely?

Dr. Reid Timmer (19:56)

Yeah, definitely there's a way to witness them safely. There's a lot of storm chasers that are live streaming out there. You can get a radar app and start learning the basics of tracking them on radar and watch the live streams to see what's happening with the storm. But there are dangers associated with it. We're just storm observers and getting our eyes on storms and trying to do science out there. But it's easier said than done to stay out of the path of a tornado.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (20:23)

Okay, I'll definitely say follow the local advisories and definitely not something you want to wing your first time.

Dr. Reid Timmer (20:28)

But no, yeah, don't wing it for safety purposes.

Dr. Samantha Yamin (20:34)

You can find out more about Dr. Reed Timmer's work and get a glimpse of these powerful storms from the perspective of a storm chaser by watching Discovery Channel series In the Eye of the Storm. That's a way to watch very safely from the comfort of your own home. Thank you Reid for being on here with us. Was so great to talk to you.

Dr. Reid Timmer (20:49)

Thank you. Never stop chasing.

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Ryan Reynolds (21:28)

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Dr. Samantha Yamin (21:59)

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Ryan Reynolds (22:01)

Can I make my site firmer?

Dr. Reid Timmer (22:03)

Can we sleep cooler?

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Dr. Reid Timmer (22:28)

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Dr. Samantha Yamin (23:02)

New research suggests that MRNA COVID 19 vaccines may do more than protect against severe illness. They could also significantly extend the lives of people undergoing treatment for certain skin and lung cancers by boosting the effectiveness of immunotherapy. The research was led by teams at the University of Texas, Maryland Anderson Cancer center and the University of Florida. They were digging into medical records spanning 2015 to 2022, looking at patients with a type of lung cancer called non small cell lung carcinoma. These patients were all taking an immune checkpoint inhibitor. That's a medication that blocks some of the regulatory steps that would normally dampen or slow the IMM immune system. This lifts the brakes on the immune system to unleash it to attack cancer cells. They identified 180 patients who received a Covid MRNA vaccine within 100 days of starting this inhibitor treatment and as a control, 704 patients who did not. People with advanced cancer who got an MRNA COVID 19 vaccine lived almost twice as long as those who didn't. The researchers also looked into records for patients with melanoma, a serious skin cancer. The difference was even more striking. Vaccinated patients were still alive and well at the end of the study, 36 months and counting, so they couldn't calculate an average survival time because it was off the charts. The researchers think maybe the MRNA vaccines rev up the immune system in a way that makes the inhibitor medication work better. See, the inhibitors can be really effective for cancer treatment, but unfortunately Half of patients don't respond to them. In follow up studies in mice, they found that the fatty nanoparticles that encase the MRNA in vaccines, plus the way MRNA enters cells seems to activate a cascade of immune cells which trains the body's killer cells to hunt for tumor cells. That's a lot of cells. It's the same standard systemic immune response that more than half of people get from an MRNA vaccine. You know those mild cold like symptoms you get for a day or two. But for the cancer patients, the checkpoint inhibitor drugs help hone the killer cells in a way that's helpful. The benefit was for vaccination with either MRNA COVID vaccine within 100 days of starting treatment, but not for other vaccines against flu or pneumonia. This surprising bonus from MRNA vaccines could expand the pool of people who can benefit from checkpoint inhibitors, offering more patients renewed hope in their fight against the disease. What I found so fascinating about this research is that its roots date back to before the turn of the 20th century. See In 1893, Dr. William Coley published case reports about patients with sarcomas. These are cancers in the soft tissue or bones. They were having spontaneous recovery if they had an infection. And in fact, over his career he purposely infected more than 1,000 patients with inoperable cancers using heat killed strains of a bacteria. This early work laid the foundation for the more controlled immunotherapies that we have today, including the BCG vaccine that treats bladder cancer by stimulating local immunity and the HPV vaccine that's remarkably effective at preventing most cervical cancers. The MD Anderson University of Florida team has been working for years to develop more personalized vaccines to stimulate the exact immune response needed. But they're also looking to do a multi institution phase three trial to validate these current results with the MRNA vaccines that are already approved to bring better outcomes to patients sooner. For Warner Bros. Discovery Curiosity Weekly is produced by the team at Wheelhouse DNA. The senior producer and editorial correspondent is Teresa Carey. Our producer is Chiara Noni. Our audio engineer is Nick Kharisimi and head of Production for Wheelhouse DNA is Cassie Berman. And I'm Dr. Samantha Yamin. Thanks for listening.

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Ryan Reynolds (27:36)

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Dr. Samantha Yamin (27:38)

Can I make my site softer?

Ryan Reynolds (27:39)

Can I make my site firmer?

Dr. Reid Timmer (27:41)

Can we sleep cooler?

Ryan Reynolds (27:43)

Sleep number does that cools up to eight times faster and let you choose your ideal comfort on either side your Sleep Number setting Enjoy personalized comfort for better sleep night after night. It's our Black Friday sale Recharge this season with a bundle of cozy, soothing comfort. Now only $17.99 for our C2 mattress and base plus free premium delivery price is higher in Alaska and Hawaii. Check it out at a Sleep number store or sleepnumber.com today.

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Paige Desorbo (28:38)

On a little secret. I've turned staying into bed into an art form. It's just my place. It's my shopping sanctuary and honestly the perfect place to hang out with all of my favorite people. So join me and some of the most interesting people I know for shopping, some laughs and maybe a few secrets. All from the comfort of my bed. And the best part, you can watch from your bed all new episodes of my show in bed with Paige Desorbo air Mondays at 8pm Eastern Standard Time on Amazon Live. Just open Prime Video on your TV and search Amazon Live to Cozy up in Bed with me, Paige desorbo Because why get out of bed if you don't have to.