‘Twisters’: How Filmmakers Rigged Glen Powell’s Tornado Chaser Truck To Be the Ultimate Survival Vehicle and Endure 130 MPH Winds

SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for “ Twisters ,” now playing in theaters.

Box Office: 'Twisters' Spinning Ahead of Forecasts With $32.2 Million Opening Day

In “Twisters,” Glen Powell’s Tyler Owens — a YouTube superstar who chases tornadoes for clicks and notoriety, as well as for the thrill of riding out his fears – drives a Dodge Ram truck was built to withstand winds of up to 130 miles per hour.

Daisy Edgar-Jones stars as Kate Cooper, a meteorologist and ex-tornado chaser who is haunted by a major storm from her past, who along with her colleague Javi (Anthony Ramos), goes up against Tyler as they find themselves working in one of the deadliest tornado seasons ever in Oklahoma. While Javi and Kate have access to sleek state-of-the-art StormPar vehicles, Tyler needed something to match his personality – an extreme meteorologist who doesn’t have a ton of money.

Sean Waugh, a research scientist at the National Severe Storm Laboratory (NSSL), worked as a consultant on the film ensuring the accurate portrayal of storm chasing and played a key part in designing Tyler’s truck. Waugh worked with the film’s production designer Patrick Sullivan to construct a vehicle that was based on reality. Sullivan says the script described it as a “battered SUV,” but he wanted something that would set Tyler apart.

In conversations with the film’s director Lee Issac Chung, the filmmaker had suggested a dually truck (dual rear wheels). The Ram was perfect. And it nodded to the 1996 original “Twister,” as Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt also drove a Ram.

This vehicle’s backstory was that it began as a shiny, new red truck, but it eventually gets battered and sucked up into the sky and crashes down, barely incarnate. Then, the truck is reborn. “It’s glued, taped and welded together. The way Frankenstein’s monster was,” Sullivan says.

Chung came up with Tyler’s logo – a tornado with horns on the grill.

The first time Tyler rides into the tornado, the full extent of the truck’s powers are revealed. As the crew plant themselves in position, rods shoot out and drill deep into the ground, holding the truck in place and preventing it from being sucked into the funnel cloud — all modifications based on real-life tornado chaser trucks.

Box Office: Glen Powell's 'Twisters' Makes $10.7 Million in Previews

Tyler’s truck is also equipped with pipes that blast fireworks into the tornado. According to Waugh, storm chasers have indeed launched instruments into severe thunderstorms and tornados for projects.

“We’ve done similar-type projects. Not necessarily driving into the tornado, but we’ve tried to get near it,” he says. “Nobody has shot fireworks into a tornado, at least not that I’ve seen. But give it a year, I guarantee you somebody does it… The firework thing was for the movie, to hype Tyler’s character and that drive for attention.”

The exoskelteon was made from welded steel tied to the truck’s frame to give the vehicle rigidity, and has a roll cage-like feel so when does get rolled, it doesn’t get crushed .

In the film, Tyler says the truck has extra weight on the chassis. Between the exoskeleton frame and grill, those help absorb the impact of that lighter debris in the first few tornadoes. Waugh points out that the tipping point of just how much the truck can withstand comes towards the film’s final sequence. “There’s debris everywhere, and that’s the real danger with strong, high winds that even Tyler’s truck can’t withstand. Exoskeleton isn’t armor plating it’s not going to stop those pieces of debris that can absolutely go through car doors and everywhere.”

So, just how much of a survival truck is Tyler’s tornado-chasing Ram?

Waugh guesses, “You could probably get away with maybe 120-130 MPH. Anything above that — and this goes for any car — once you start getting wind underneath it, you’re going to start changing the aerodynamics of the vehicle.” He continues, “That’s when you start running into problems like tipping, rolling or flying. I don’t care how much armor plating you have, you get hit with a tree, it’s going to start causing problems.”

He adds: “If I were driving that into the real world, I’d be adding some additional panels, more armor plating and I’d replace the windows with something a bit stronger or cover over them to keep the debris and rocks from breaking out your windows.”

New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week