A lot of things have given me the inspiration to take on the field of meteorology; one of them being that there aren't many people out there with those types of interests. Another thing that contributed were occurrence famous tornados that happened between 1990 - 2025, the most recent major one being in 2025, occurring in Enderlin, North Dakota. The tornado roared through Enderlin, and was originally rated as an EF3 with windspeeds of 160 mph. But there was a catch. After Incident Meteorologists (IMETs) went further with an additional investigation, it led the tornado to being ranked an EF5, the highest classification of a tornado on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, as all tornadoes ranked EF5 must exceed windspeeds of 201 mph.
During the investigation, it was recorded that a freight train had been lifted and tossed nearly 500 feet off the tracks, knocking over several fully loaded grain hopper cars, which can contain common cargos of cereal grains (e.g., wheat, barley), oilseeds and legumes, or byproducts. After collaboration with damage experts and Western University's Storm Lab, it was estimated that to completely overturn a fully loaded grain hopper, the tornado had to have windspeeds of 230 mph, and 266 - 280 mph to further launch the other two grain hopper cars farther than the first one.
This expedition made it the first time in 12 years that a tornado had been given an EF5 rank, since the devastation of Moore, Oklahoma in 2013. It is intriguing factors such as these, other testimonies and survival stories that make me want to learn more about weather phenomena; how natural disasters form, how they move, how they strengthen from certain factors, and how they can become a hazard if not people aren't warned in time.
It was ranked as the fifth top tornado with the highest windspeeds, as the first tornado was to accomplish such a feat was the 1999 Bridge Creek-Moore tornado, with windspeeds exceeding 321 mph; the second tornado being the 2024 Greenfield-Iowa tornado, exceeding 318 mph; the third, the 2013 El-Reno-Oklahoma, exceeding 302-318 mph; and the fourth, the El-Reno-Piedmont, Oklahoma tornado with windspeeds clocking at 295 mph.
A book that also inspired me was called "I Survived: Tornado Terror"; this book happened to inspire me so much that when I was in Riverview in 5th Grade, I completed a project poster on it; I also had the pleasure of talking with the mayor of Ahoskie and his co-worker at the high school about how they weren't any local weather stations around the area. In conclusion, all of these factors have deeply fascinated me with severe weather, including additional motivation from scientific investigations, protecting communities, and building up my passion from childhood experiences.