SLU Professor has been flying into hurricanes since 2006 for scientific research

ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - We're just beginning to see the extent of the devastation of Hurricane Milton Thursday.

Dr. Bob Pasken has seen the power of these storms from a unique perspective.

Pasken is an associate professor of meteorology at Saint Louis University and he's been flying INTO hurricanes since 2006. Pasken says he has flown into about twenty hurricanes.

"When you fly into a hurricane, you don't fly directly into the eye of the hurricane," said Pasken on Total Information A.M. Thursday. "What you do is you start down low somewhere down 400-500 feet off the ocean's surface."

"You start in one of the spiral vans that are in the hurricane and then you spiral in all the way to the top and across the eye of the hurricane and then you get back into the spiral van and go back down again."

Pasken has worked for years to find a better understanding of why some hurricanes weaken while others become monster storms. Pasken drops sensors that measure temperature, relative humidity, pressure, as well as wind speed, and direction.. there are also sensors on board the plane.

"Is it a rough ride? Yes. Is it one of the most fun things I've ever done in my life? Yes it is," said Pasken. "When you fly into a hurricane, it's a rough ride....yes are harnessed into the airplane and I have come out of some of these flights bruised, even though I have a five-point harness on, simply because of the bounces as bad as it is."

"But I still when given the opportunity I would go back and do it again in a heartbeat."

Pasken has been on planes that have been struck by lightning and on one flight had to turn back when a bird was sucked into an engine.

Pasken also discussed with KMOX about the impact and severity of Hurricane Milton, which was a surprise for many weather experts like him.

"We had been watching the Gulf of Mexico and South Atlantic for the development of hurricanes since early August and we had not seen anything develop," said Pasken. "The storm that is now Milton, we watched it develop and forecast models showed it developing then dying off, developing then dying off."

"All of sudden, it got access to some very warm weather in the Gulf of Mexico and it exploded. It rapidly developed. There are a lot of questions that are open about why it grew this rapidly, but certainly the water temperature in the Gulf of Mexico is one of the driving factors."