The Fujita Scale

I saw another good episode of American Experience, this one is on Ted Fujita.

He had tornados figured out pretty well, and was the first to really categorize their destructive power accurately.  He was on-site to study the aftermath of the atom bomb at Nagasaki and went to the top of a mountain to dangerous take pressure readings during a storm.  While most meteorologists were interested in slower and seasonal weather patterns, he was interested in the accute dynamics of thunderstorms. When he arrived at the University of Chicago in the post-war years, he found himself conveniently living not far from "Tornado Alley".  The rest is history, as they say.