For our Season 3 opener, we begin with a very special extended episode in an interview with three women in the United States Air Force 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron at Keesler Air Force Base, MS - known to most as the Hurricane Hunters.

Lt Col Kait McLaughlin was the first female chief aerial reconnaissance weather officer for the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron. She’s currently the 403rd Operations Group Aerial Reconnaissance Weather Officer (or, ARWO) Standards and Evaluations Officer.

Capt. Sarah Olsen is an Aerial Reconnaissance Weather Officer in the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron. She serves as a flight meteorologist, mission director, and National Hurricane Center liaison for aerial weather reconnaissance missions.

Capt. Amaryllis Cotto is currently a meteorologist at the National Weather Service Houston/Galveston, and a meteorologist for the U.S. Air Force Reserves, as part of the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron.

Mentions during show: United States Air Force 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron - https://www.403wg.afrc.af.mil/About/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/192529/

EPISODE SPONSOR This episode is sponsored by Ventusky, a weather mapping application combining models and real-time radar and satellite data globally to provide useful visuals for a variety of weather-related needs. For more information, check out ventusky.com.

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo. Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook and Bluesky at the handle girlswhochase. See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8dosZVkS3PXHIO8XpjVt1g. Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase

GWC closes Season 2 with a very special episode. We had the opportunity to speak with three leaders who are all making significant contributions to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in the weather space - and they’re tackling it from very different directions.

Dr. Stella Kafka is the Chief Executive of the American Meteorological Society.

Dr. Melissa Burt is an Associate Professor and Associate Dean for Diversity and Inclusion in the Department of Atmospheric Science and College of Engineering at Colorado State University. She is also the Vice President for the non-profit 501(c)3 organization, the Earth Science Women’s Network, and a co-founder of Science Moms, a non-partisan group of climate scientists and mothers working to give our children the planet they deserve.

Dr. Kim Klockow-McClain is a Senior Social Scientist with the National Weather Service, and serves as the National Center for Environmental Prediction Coordinator for Social Science Applications.

References during show: American Meteorological Society: https://www.ametsoc.org/ AMS Annual Meeting 2024: https://annual.ametsoc.org/index.cfm/2024/ Clear Skies Ahead podcast: https://www.ametsoc.org/index.cfm/ams/education-careers/careers/career-guides-tools/all-about-careers-in-meteorology/clear-skies-ahead-podcast/

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo.

“Motivation Orchestra” for Spring Training promo is licensed via Envato. Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @girlswhochase. See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - youtube.com/girlswhochase Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase

Karen Kosiba has always been fascinated by the world around her.  As a child she collected caterpillars, built model bridges, took lots of photos, and stayed up late watching lightning.  When she started college, she considered careers in architecture, patent law, and veterinary medicine, but ultimately decided that observational studies of severe weather (somehow) combined all of her interests. Karen now the Managing Director of the F.A.R.M. (Flexible Array of Radars and Mesonets) Facility and is an Adjunct Research Professor at the University of Illinois. Her research mainly focuses on the kinematics and dynamics of severe convective storms, characterizing the low-level wind structure in tornadoes, and understanding the boundary layer winds and small-scale structures in landfalling hurricanes. Key to her research is executing field projects to collect data that can be analyzed to better understand and predict these hazardous weather events.  A strong believer in experiencing weather from the inside of a mobile weather radar, she has participated as a radar operator, project scientist, and project leader in a multitude of field projects. She has collected data in over 100 tornadoes and has deployed radars in nine hurricanes. Additionally, she is passionate about science education, regularly participating in outreach activities at schools, museums, and festivals, and in media interviews.  She has a B.S. and an M.S. in Physics, an M.A.T in Teacher Education, and a Ph.D. in Atmospheric Science.

A quick disclaimer about this interview, which was originally recorded in November 2022 –  while the project references are good, the timing on the projects is going to sound a bit off. Please take note of this when dates are referenced in the discussion. 

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo. 

“Motivation Orchestra” for Spring Training promo is licensed via Envato.

Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com.

Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @girlswhochase.

See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - youtube.com/girlswhochase

Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase

Jessica Moore (joined on this episode by her daughter, Lily) is a meteorologist, photographer, and storm chaser of over 10 years based out of Colorado Springs, CO. She has a degree in Broadcast & Operational Meteorology from Mississippi State University. Jessica grew up enamored by the wild weather extremes she experienced in Colorado, which sparked her passion for storm photography. Her passion is being in the field documenting all modes of extreme weather, from fires and floods to blizzards, hail storms, and tornadoes. She worked with WeatherNationTV as a field correspondent for over a year, and her extreme weather footage has been on The Weather Channel, ABC, NBC, CNN, CBS, AccuWeather, FOX Weather, and more. She recently launched a storm chasing tour company called Stormscapes Photo Tours and looks forward to sharing her passion for weather with her tour guests.

References during show: COMET’s MetEd program: https://www.meted.ucar.edu/index.php Tim Vasquez: https://www.thriftbooks.com/a/tim-vasquez/458299/

Jessica Moore social and links: Twitter: @JessicaMooreWx and @stormscapestour IG: @jessicamoore.photographer Facebook: @jessicamoorestormchaser YouTube: @jessicamooremeteorologist

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo.

Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @girlswhochase. See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - youtube.com/girlswhochase Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase

Kathryn is an Emmy Award-winning Senior Meteorologist and Producer for NBC News in New York where she is responsible for all weather content that airs nationally across all platforms, including The Today Show and Nightly News. Before NBC, Kathryn spent five years as a meteorologist and weather producer at The Weather Channel.

In addition to working at NBC News, Kathryn is co-founder and EVP of Monarch Weather & Climate Intelligence. At Monarch, she identifies emerging markets in need of weather and climate insights, seeks out strategic partnerships, provides expert analysis, and supports the team in account and project management.

Kathryn has been storm chasing since 2010, and says that’s really where her true passion lies. Kathryn is also proud to be one of the few active female Certified Consulting Meteorologists (CCM) in the world. She holds a bachelor’s and a master’s from Virginia Tech.

Storm Prediction Center: https://www.spc.noaa.gov/ NOAA: https://www.noaa.gov/

Kathryn Prociv social and links: Twitter: @KathrynProciv

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo.  “Motivation Orchestra” for Spring Training promo is licensed via Envato.

Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @girlswhochase. See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - youtube.com/girlswhochase Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase

Shannon Bileski is a landscape photographer from Manitoba, Canada. She’s been fascinated with storms since she was very young, and started trying to get decent shots of lighting at age 8. She saw her first tornado in 2007 and purchased a DSLR camera right after that to start taking storm photography more seriously. In 2009, she finally got her first real shot of lightning - and now has over 15 years of storm photography experience under her belt. She’s a fully self-taught chaser and travels thousands of miles every year both in the United States and Canada to seek out and shoot storms. 

Shannon Bileski social and links:  Twitter: @shannbil Instagram: @shannbil YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@shannbil1 https://signatureexposures.zenfolio.com/ 

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo.  “Motivation Orchestra” for Spring Training promo is licensed via Envato.

Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @girlswhochase. See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - youtube.com/girlswhochase Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase

Storm chaser and extreme meteorologist Dr. Reed Timmer probably needs no introduction to this audience. Reed has been storm chasing since the mid 1990s, when he destroyed the family video camera in hail filming a severe thunderstorm in his family’s front yard. He went on to obtain his Bachelor’s and then PhD in meteorology from the University of Oklahoma. Since then, he has been living his dream capturing the most extreme weather across the United States, Canada and other parts of the globe. He filmed his first tornado in 1998, and is the first person to capture high definition video inside a tornado. He was one of the first significant severe weather content creators, and his footage continues to be purchased and shared widely. He is the star of the 2008 Discovery Channel TV series ‘Storm Chasers’ and has appeared in several other widely recognized television series, including Tornado Chasers and Storm Rising.

Reed Timmer social and links: Twitter: @ReedTimmerAccu  Facebook: facebook.com/reedtimmer2.0 Instagram: @ReedTimmer  YouTube: youtube.com/tornadovideos 

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo.  “Motivation Orchestra” for Spring Training promo is licensed via Envato.

Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @girlswhochase. See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - youtube.com/girlswhochase Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase

Liz Leitman is a meteorologist at the National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center in Norman, OK. Until very recently, she was the ONLY female forecaster at the Storm Prediction Center, which was a pretty standout statistic. In her role as a Mesoscale/Outlook forecaster, she diagnoses and forecasts severe thunderstorm and tornado potential across the United States.  She has also conducted research in severe storms meteorology - including derechos and tornadoes - as well as in fire weather forecasting, and risk communication. When Liz isn’t skillfully predicting the next severe weather setup, she may be out chasing herself. She’s also a passionate advocate for women in STEM, mental health and ADHD.

Mentions during show: NOAA Data in the Classroom: https://dataintheclassroom.noaa.gov/ NOAA Hollings Scholarship program: https://www.noaa.gov/office-education/hollings-scholarship

Liz Leitman social and links: Twitter: @WXLiz 

The Girls Who Chase Podcast is recorded and edited by Jen Walton. “Badlands” - our music - is by Lori Bailey and Inês Lobo. 

Find out all about us and more at www.girlswhochase.com. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at @girlswhochase. See our videos & podcast media on YouTube under Girls Who Chase Storms - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8dosZVkS3PXHIO8XpjVt1g. Please support our important work on Patreon: www.patreon.com/girlswhochase