All photos, video and text © 2007 by Storm Highway. Unauthorized use prohibited - see site copyright statement You will hear me repeat this again and again - the most dangerous part of storm chasing is not the storms - it's being on the road! It may surprise you to hear that in my 15 years of storm chasing, the closest calls I've had were never storm-related, but always driving-related. I can't think of one time that a tornado, flood, hurricane or lightning strike made me genuinely fear for my safety - but like all of us, I have plenty of stories about near-misses on the road. The risks from driving always far exceed the risks from the skies - not only for storm chasers but for every driver out on the roads. In fact, someone who commutes in their car for more than 10 miles every day has a higher risk of getting hurt than I do during all of the storm chasing expeditions I embark on every year around the USA. You'll see that fact firsthand in this compilation of close calls and dangerous driving captured on the dashcam of the Storm Highway chase vehicle - some during actual storm chases, but more often during normal day-to-day driving. NEW: Rear camera and new HD front camera installed! There are currently two dashcam systems operating in my car - always recording when the car is in use, similar to the dashcam systems used in police cruisers. The front-facing camera is a memory card-based high-definition camcorder (removeable and taken inside when the car is parked). Whenever something interesting, dramatic or outrageous happens on the road in front of me, I just push a button on the camera to save the video file to an SD card that I can then download later to my laptop for posterity - and of course post it here! The rear-facing camera (the 'tailgate cam') is a permanently-mounted camera/VCR system focused on the road to the rear of the vehicle. If something of note happens behind me, I'll pull the tape, store a digital copy - and then of course, post it on this page! If I have adequate advance warning of an incident, I'll activate one of my better cameras to capture the scene. Just like a rear-view mirror, the wide-angle lenses on these cameras make vehicles look farther away than they actually are - IE, 'objects are closer than they appear'. For updates to this page, stay tuned to the Storm Highway blog or subscribe to the blog RSS/XML feed. February 16, 2008 - Red light run at blind intersection - Charleston, WV Cross-traffic thankfully sees this car about to run the red light before pulling out in front of it. Watch Video February 4, 2008 - Lightning hits power line - Belle, WV A lightning strike hits a power line on a mountainside, causing a brief glow of superheated metal. Watch Video February 1, 2008 - Black ice on I-64 exit ramp - Shady Spring, WV Unexpected black ice on a sharply curving exit ramp off I-64 nearly causes an accident. Watch Video January 30, 2008 - Fallen tree limb run-over - Charleston, WV The first file from the new HD dashcam system! A fallen tree limb on Keystone Drive appears suddenly around a curve during a windstorm. Watch Video November 23, 2007 - Near-accident on Cantley Drive, Charleston, WV On Black Friday at the intersection of Fort Hill Drive and Cantley Drive in Charleston, a car driven by a teenager on a cell phone pulls out in front of a car driven by another teenager on a cell phone who manages to stop in time. Watch Video November 9, 2007 - DUI on I-64 at Nitro, WV A drunk driver weaves from side to side on Interstate 64 westbound near Nitro, West Virginia after midnight on a Friday night. Watch Video October 24, 2007 - Near miss on I-77 southbound at Hillsville, VA Traveling southbound on I-77 in moderate rain near Hillsville, Virginia, about to pass a tractor-trailer truck at 65mph when a slow-moving sedan suddenly changes lanes into my path. Watch Video October 25, 2007 - Near miss on I-40 westbound at Durham, NC Traveling westbound on I-40 in light rain at Durham, North Carolina, a pickup truck nearly clips the left front of my vehicle at over 80mph as the driver makes a series of sudden lane changes. Watch Video October 25, 2007 - Dangerous pass on I-77 northbound at over 80mph Traveling northbound on a wet I-77 in light rain at Camp Creek, West Virginia, about to pass a tractor-trailer truck at 70mph when a pickup truck passes me on the right, then rapidly changes lanes in front of me on the dark, wet highway at over 80mph. Watch Video