Martin founded Tempest Tours in 2000 and brought on-board storm chaser William T. Reid to help develop the company. His goal was to create a professionally operated storm chasing tour company that would focus on education and safety. Since that time, Lisius and Reid have recruited and assembled the most respected team of storm chasers in America. Lisius is also a filmmaker and founder of StormStock, a collection of high-end weather and climate footage. He has written and directed several film projects about severe weather including, “The Chasers of Tornado Alley: Touching the Sky” (2024). He is chairman of the Texas Severe Storms Association, author of "The Ultimate Severe Weather Safety Guide," and worked as a technical advisor on the 1996 movie “Twister.” When not doing storm stuff, Martin enjoys good BBQ, movies, football, skiing and relaxing at the Lisius Haus.

Tracking storms since 1991, William Reid is arguably the best storm chaser on the planet. He possesses all the right attributes including exceptional forecasting and logistical skills, a dedication to safety, and an uncanny ability to find good storms even on marginal days. Bill is a member of the Texas Severe Storms Association Board of Directors. He acquired a Masters degree in Geography, with emphasis on Climatology, from California State University. He has worked for 16 years as a climatologist for Continental Weather and Earth Sciences, Inc. and has contributed materials used by the National Weather Service for storm surveys and to train storm spotters nationwide for 20 years. He is a member of the legendary "Spencer 4." Be sure to visit Bill's Storm Bruiser website to see incredible storm shots, and to read his insightful storm chase summaries.

Chris began perusing storms in 1996 and was able to document his first tornado in May of 1998. An electrical engineer by trade, he is self taught in the aspects of severe weather forecasting. Chris is a trained storm spotter and contributes to National Weather Service storm surveys. Always armed with a camera, his beautiful storm photography has appeared in books, magazines, art work and training material. Taking a hiatus from his work in 2004, Chris began working with Operation Migration and the endangered Whooping Crane. Each year he helps raise a new flock of young birds and leads them from Wisconsin to Florida with an ultra-light aircraft.

Bob earned his Ph.D. from the School of Meteorology at the University of Oklahoma where he chased two seasons with the Doppler on Wheels crew. He has been fascinated with storms since the age of six, and has chased since 1991, intercepting storms from Minnesota to Colorado to Texas. His career in meteorology has included two years as chief meteorologist for KEYC-TV in Mankato, MN, a year of teaching meteorology courses at St. Cloud State University, and a year doing research as a postdoctoral fellow at Colorado State University. He contributes to public safety as an active storm spotter. Outside of the chase season, he works for WindLogics, Inc., a company specializing in wind energy resource assessment and forecasting. In his spare time, Bob teaches cross country skiing for the Minnesota Youth Ski League and is active in the Mount Itasca Nordic Ski Association. .

Kim is the first person most of our guests encounter. She has been with the team since 2013 and has chased with the team and Martin in the Low and High Plains. Kim is an expert at making things run smoothly for guests and staff, from getting our vehicles ready for the season, to booking lodging and handling travel challenges. She is a trained storm spotter and coordinator for the TESSA National Storm Conference, an event dedicated to severe weather safety education.

Matt has been fascinated with severe weather since he was a kid. He spent his childhood in the tornado prone states of Texas and Indiana and experienced several close tornado encounters. In 2010, he took his first trip to tornado alley and saw his first tornadoes. Matt attended the meteorology school at Purdue University (2013). He’s worked as a storm chasing tour guide since 2013 while also helping with various photography workshops along the way. Matt lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota and works for a major airline.

Brian has been fascinated with storms from childhood. In middle school, a science teacher told him about researchers traveling the plains to study and observe tornadoes, which was about the coolest thing he'd heard of. He never thought he'd have a chance to do something like this, until tagging along with a storm chasing friend in 2005. He's been chasing every year since, combining a love of photography, travel and learning new things. Brian serves as a pastor in Fond du Lac, WI, where he and his wife have lived since 1999.

Justin's fascination with weather began when he saw his first tornado when he was six years old. Since then, he wanted to learn about weather. He studied Meteorology at Northern Illinois University and graduated with his bachelor's degree in 2011. In 2009, he began chasing with Tempest Tours as a guest and saw the Goshen County, WY tornado in June 2009. Since then, he witnessed the tornado that struck Mapleton, IA (2011), El Reno, OK (2013), 3 tornadoes near Lodgepole, SD (2015), and numerous photogenic supercells that appear each year. In 2012, he became a driver/guide, and he has not looked back since. Justin is married to his wife, Emily, and they are expecting a baby girl in April 2018. He is an avid Cubs fan who saw his team win the World Series in 2016. 

Bill is a native Southern Californian who spent 31 years in law enforcement and 9 years as a Paid Call Firefighter/EMT. A self taught weather fanatic, Bill has been chasing on the high plains for nearly 10 years. When home during the off season, flying, camping and traveling are his hobbies until the next chase season rolls around.

Bob has been chasing and photographing severe weather in northern California and southern Oregon for more than 35 years, and on the Great Plains since 2007. His fascination for thunderstorms started as a child in Arizona where some of his earliest memories were of Monsoon thunderstorms and haboobs.  Bob is retired from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and is a trained weather spotter for three National Weather Service Forecast Offices: Portland Oregon; Medford, Oregon; and Sacramento, California.  Bob and Diana split their time between Yreka, California and Lincoln City, Oregon.  Bob has been a Tempest Tours Guide since 2011. 

Ron has been chasing for over 15 years, loves the magical draw of the plains, the challenge of the weather puzzle, and the beauty of the supercell. He works as a local director of Youth for Christ, an outreach to area teens. Ron and his wife Laura have 4 great kids and live in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.

Gary has over 30 + years of paid and volunteer experience in several areas within emergency services. Gary has worked in hospital emergency rooms, ambulance, public health, incident response teams, and instructional work. He has a degree in Emergency Management, Homeland Security American Board Certified and Master Anti-Terrorism Specialist -The Anti-Terrorism Accreditation Board. Gary teaches Community Emergency Response Training CCERT), and disaster preparedness.

Gary retired from the City of St. Louis completing a 30 year career . Gary spent his career with the city on the Emergency Medical System, Fire Department a Deputized City Marshal and eventually retired from the position of Commissioner of the Emergency Management Agency where he coordinated all phases of Emergency Management Prevention, Preparedness, Response, Recovery, and Mitigation. Vice-President and Deputy Commander of the Missouri Disaster Response System and President of the Greater St. Louis Critical Incident Stress Management Team.  

Gary started his second career with St. Luke’s Hospital as the Director of Safety and Security.

Chris began storm chasing with Tempest Tours in 2013 with his Dad (Steve Pekich, a current guide with Tempest). Chris has always had an interest in severe weather. His first trip with Tempest was in 2013, the year of the El Reno tornado when he became hooked. He currently lives in Los Angeles and works as a teacher and real estate agent.

Tom Trott is a citizen of London, England. Tom is a self-employed builder, husband to Alison and dad of two fabulous children, William and Olivia. Thank you, Alison, for permitting Tom to work for us every spring! Tom has been hooked on supercells and thunderstorms since watching "Twister" 20 years ago, and he loves chasing them down and photographing them.

Like a lot of people, Brittany’s fascination for extreme weather started the day she saw Twister. From the age of 8, she always had a strong passion, but growing up on the east coast, the thought of seeing a tornado was a far stretch. In 2018, Brittany decided to finally fulfill her dream, and traveled out west. She covered 14k miles in one month, in hopes of seeing tornadoes and creating a documentary about storm chasers. She collaborated with Tempest Tours, and worked closely with Bill Reid and Chris Guillikson. Brittany is excited to chase again with the team, and continue learning about meteorology. In her spare time she loves to travel the world, and practice film making. She currently works as a high fashion photographer in New Jersey. Brittany organizes a swimsuit drive for the charity “Bras for a Cause”, which accepts lightly worn swimsuits for breast cancer survivors.

Craig has been chasing storms for the past 25 years and has had the opportunity to chase with many different research groups during this time. He was part of a research group during the May 3rd, 1999 outbreak in Oklahoma. Craig was also part of the special Tempest Tour with the group from China in 2018. Craig is a high school science teacher of chemistry, physics, and meteorology. He has brought his high school meteorology students from Minnesota to the National Weather Center as a STEM Live Event Learning experience for many years. He is a retired fire fighter and live burn instructor. He lives in northern Minnesota and enjoys life on the water and snow.

Growing up near Sacramento, California, Tony rarely experienced thunderstorms, and certainly never a supercell. Nonetheless, Tony still fell in love with thunderstorms at the age of six. He remembers purchasing storm-chasing videos with allowance money and dreaming of seeing a supercell in person. But it wasn't until June of 2023 that Tony finally pursued his dream of chasing a supercell. Tony was immediately hooked, joining our team within a year. Tony works in higher education, leading development opportunities for faculty and staff of Santa Clara University. In his spare time, Tony loves roasting his own coffee beans, sipping the coffee made from those beans, going to fitness classes, meditating, reading, being an uncle, traveling the world, eating delicious food, and watching lots of baseball and football.

Having a strong curiosity about extreme weather since his youth, Richard became hooked when he combined his interest in timelapse photography with storm chasing. He feels that still photographs of severe weather show the beauty and power of nature, but timelapse offers the viewer an opportunity to witness the tempest from its inception, to the height of its power, and ultimately to its quiet dissipation. Richard is a former Naval Aviator and is currently the semi-retired CEO of a DC-based IT company. He has an undergraduate degree in Meteorology from the University of Oklahoma and a Master's degree in Electrical Engineering from the Naval Postgraduate School. He enjoys travel, running, photography, and mountaineering, but eagerly looks forward to storm season all year long.

Matt is in charge of coordinating our social media activities. He is a new graduate of the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin (Business Management and Sports Marketing). His career goal is to become an NFL GM. Matt is a member of the National Honor Society, Sigma Chi Fraternity and Mu Alpha Theta. He is a former wide receiver and goal keeper for Arlington Lamar HS. He likes music, Xbox, skiing, Taco Bell and Cadbury chocolate Easter eggs.